


By This Still Hearth

by Hekate1308



Category: Endeavour (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Case Fic, Gen, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-06
Updated: 2018-08-24
Packaged: 2019-06-22 17:42:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 40,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15587247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hekate1308/pseuds/Hekate1308
Summary: He wakes up disoriented. For a moment, he wonders if he had too much to drink last night – an occurrence that is becoming all too common; but no; yesterday they finally arrested the man who has been responsible for no less than four murders within the last two months, and even Morse was too tired to go to a pub.The truth, as it turns out, is far more complicated. A story of how things could have gone differently.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> My first Endeavour mult-chapter fic - promise I will do my best to update weekly. Enjoy!

He wakes up disoriented. For a moment, he wonders if he had too much to drink last night – an occurrence that is becoming all too common; but no; yesterday they finally arrested the man who has been responsible for no less than four murders within the last two months, and even Morse was too tired to go to a pub.

He cranks his eyes open and frowns; later, he will think that considering everything, he stays rather remarkably calm.

Because this is quite obviously not his flat.

If he didn’t know any better –

He sits up, surprised to see that he’s wearing pyjamas even though he could have sworn he went straight to bed last night, without bothering to change.

The fact that he doesn’t recognize the pyjamas either is rather one of the least strange things that have happened so far.

Because if this actually is –

Morse gets out of bed and walks to the window.

 He’s right.

This is most definitely a dwelling at Lonsdale College. He might never have finished his degree, but he still spent years here, and this looks like the room of an associate professor.

While it doesn’t explain what he is doing here, it does help to know where he is. He would like to go through the place in order to figure out how he ended up in this particular bed, but he cannot risk to anger yet another academic, not when he’s just returned to work after his time in prison and the cabin.

So he quickly dresses into a suit he finds in the closet – it’s his size at least, and considering how many clothes there are, there’s a good chance the owner won’t notice immediately.

Morse hoped he could make it out of Lonsdale without drawing attention to himself.

It’s not to be.

One or two minutes after he’s left the rooms, someone calls out “Dev!” At first, he pays them no attention, but then they continue calling out, “Dev! Devy! Endeavour!”

He then has no choice but to turn around and is astonished when he sees Jerome Hogg hurry towards him. He was one of the few who never stuck to the nickname “Pagan” and instead constantly used his last name.

“There you are!” he clasps his shoulder in a gesture that speaks of greater familiarity than he’s ever shown him before. “You are a sight for sore eyes. Where have you been these last few days?”

The last few days? Morse is not aware that they had an appointment, or why Jerome should be surprised not to see a man he hasn’t met in months. “I’ve had a lot to do.”

He chuckles. “I’d say. You have that drawn-out look again. Let’s go get breakfast”.

Morse judges it best to comply.

They pass the porter’s lodge; the second he sees them, he hurries out, grinning. “Excuse me, sir!”

Morse assumes he is talking to Jerome, but it’s him he addresses. “Your mother called. I am supposed to tell you that your mother is expecting you for dinner tonight, and that it will be impossible to excuse yourself from it. I’m sorry, sir, but she said to tell you exactly that –“

“It’s alright” Morse says, throwing Jerome a glance. While he seems to share the porter’s mirth, there is no indication that he remembers that Morse’s mother has been dead for decades, and Jerome is not one to forget gossip easily.

“A good idea from me, then, dragging you to breakfast. When she asks you when you last ate, you won’t have to lie.”

He doesn’t know how to reply.

As they walk to the dining hall, he cannot help but observes that the few students who are already around greet him with as much reverence, and perhaps more enthusiasm, as Jerome. He’s growing more confused with very second that passes. Is this a time? If so, it feels more realistic than any dream he’s ever had before.

“There we are. And you better clean your plate, young man, I won’t be at the end of your mother’s glares again – I am rather sure the last one stole several years of my life.”

Again that reference to his mother. But he can hardly ask how or when Jerome met her.

At least they are not disturbed during breakfast. Morse manages to eat, even though it’s still too little for Jerome; the whole meal, he acts less like the somewhat friendly acquaintances they are and more like they are close friends. He even reigns in the gossip he knows Morse abhors, instead keeping up a steady stream of information about Lonsdale; some of the names he mentions Morse knows, others he’s not familiar with.

“And then old Pinnock criticized Manston’s Hebrew translation a bit too rashly – you know how he can be – and they almost came to blows, Pinter had to get in-between... But then, who am I talking to? You and your obsession with grammar...”

Who he is talking to, Morse has come to realize, is someone Jerome for some reason regards as a fellow associate at Lonsdale, rather then the policeman he knows. He decides to play along, for now.

At least it’s Saturday, and he won’t bee expected to hold any lectures.

After breakfast – and he has faithfully promised to Jerome that yes, he will have family dinner tonight – he returns to what he now realizes must be his own rooms in this strange world he woke up in.

Clearly, he was not lucid upon waking, for it soon becomes clear that if he had given the room more than a cursory glance, he would have noticed certain things. The pictures of him and what must be his colleagues, considering he recognizes a few faces from his student days – Jerome must indeed be a close friend of his here, based on the fact that he’s in more than one – his favourite books on the shelves, his records in a drawer –

He frowns when he finds a record of the Wildwood amongst his other music. Why would he –

It’s not the only new addition to his collection. There are a few Jazz pieces, even more classical recordings – some of which he has been wishing for, but couldn’t afford – and even _It’s All Over Now_ by the Rolling Stones. What is going on?

He repairs to the bedroom he woke up in, finding a wallet that’s presumably his on the nightstand. He grabs it only to be struck by the picture that he apparently keeps in it ( a habit he definitely didn’t have when he was himself).

It is a picture of him and the Thursdays. While it is somewhat reassuring to learn that he still knows them here, it is rather confusing as to why he should ever have been in contact with the police, or grown close enough to them to have their picture taken with his arm around Sam Thursday’s shoulders; and even if –

**“Boys, stop it. I want a nice picture.”**

**“Dev started it” Sam complains despite their old family joke that he never does.**

**“I don’t care who started it, I’m ending it!”**

**“Can’t you talk to her” he pleads, but Dev only laughs and ruffles his hair.**

**“Shouldn’t you know by now that pleading won’t help you when Mother uses that tone?”**

**He shoves his hand away. “Stop that. I’m taller than you!”**

Morse shakes his head, confused about what he just saw. Certainly...

No. It’s already slipping away, leaving him once more with the mystery why he would have a picture of the Thursdays’ in his wallet. 

* * *

Unsure of how to proceed, he decides to phone Joyce. Maybe she can make sense of all this.

No one picks up the phone, however, not even Gwen, who usually always seems to know when he calls so she can scold him about anything that comes to mind once more.

God, he hopes Joyce is alright.

* * *

He spends the rest of a day trying to wake up – as illogical as it is, it still makes the most sense to consider all of this a dream.

By the time the sun sets, he knows he has to try something else.

* * *

Whoever the mother he is supposed to have dinner with is, he won’t be attending. Since he does know the Thursdays, there is no reason not to ask for the inspector’s help.

At the very least, he could help him to make sense of all this.

Thankfully there is some kind of connection between them, so even if they are changed like everyone Morse meets, they won’t –

To his surprise, he’s barely reached the door of the house before it is thrown wide open.

In the next moment, Mrs. Thursday ushers him in, a big smile on her face. “I saw you walk up! Come in, Dev!”

“That’s very –“

He’s interrupted by her all but robbing him of his coat. “You’ll end up giving yourself a heat stroke” he scolds him, “And you’ve lost weight again. Have you eaten today?”

“I had breakfast at college –“

“Good.”

And then, all his theories crash and burn.  

Because Mrs. Thursday simply throws a glance at the clock on the wall and says, “Your father should come home any minute, now.”


	2. Family Reunion

_The first body is found on the third day of a blistering heat wave unlike any Oxford has ever seen before, and all of them are sweating by the time they make it to the scene of the crime. It’s a small alleyway between two factory buildings, easily overlooked unless, like the unfortunate man who found it, one is clamouring for a smoke._

_Doctor Debryn, like always, seems like the only one unaffected, still wearing his usual bow tie, shirt and vest as if it was in the middle of the winter._

_“I am afraid this is exactly what it looks like, gentlemen. She was strangled, and from what I can tell, there seem to have been... very unsavoury motives involved, but we will only know after the autopsy.”_

_Morse tugs at his collar, feeling the sweat run down his spine, doing his best not to look at the body. “How long has she been lying here?”_

_“Not for long. Otherwise, in this heat...” DeBryn doesn’t finish the sentence._

_Thursday clears his throat. “Alright, then. We need –“_

_“I ordered some recruits to help look for her clothes and belongings, sir” Morse says._

_He nods. “God knows they won’t have it easy in this weather.” There’s a certain tone in his voice, one that Morse has come to associate with the difficult times in his DI’s life, and it’s easy to tell that he’s thinking of the war and Africa._

_“It can’t have been easy to get her here” Jakes says, oblivious to what’s going on, clearly fidgeting for a cigarette._

_“There are mostly offices and factories around. At night, no one would have seen him” Morse replies._

_“Still – I doubt anyone who wasn’t local would know about this place” Thursday says. “It’s not the kind of dumping ground you just stumble over.”_

_Morse has to agree._

_“Ah, I am afraid things just got more complicated” Doctor DeBryn announces. He’s rolled the body onto her back, and Morse forces himself to look._

_Both an infinity symbol and a pentagram have been cut into her chest. He swallows and looks away, hearing Jakes scoff as he does so._

_“Sir, the watchmen of neither factories reported – what’s this?”_

_Jim Strange, as ready to do what needs to be done as always._

_“That’s what we’re all asking ourselves, Sergeant” DeBryn answers dryly, “If you should come up with a solution, be sure to let us know. I’ll get her to my office and do the autopsy as soon as possible.”_

_None of them objects. It’s clear they can’t leave her here in the sweltering heat for too long._

_“Never liked those types of thing” Thursday says in the car, “Pentagrams, symbols, the occult.”_

_“We don’t know there’s a connection to the occult yet, sir” Jakes pipes up in the back and while Morse knows he’s right, his instincts are telling him it is. There’s more to this than just your usual vile human being getting off by crushing others._

_Since they don’t have a name, there is not much to do aside from going over the missing person’s reports._

_There’s one Morse instantly has a bad feeling about. The description fits. Miranda Taylor, sixteen, long blonde hair, 118 pounds, left home a week ago and hasn’t been seen since._

_If it’s her – whoever did this must have kept her somewhere. Alive. For a few days, at least._

_He tells Thursday, and they are off to talk to her family._

_His hands tighten on the steering wheel. It’s his least favourite part of his work – asking people politely to confirm that, yes, they indeed just suffered one of the most tragic losses of their lives._

_A woman in her early forties opens the door for them. Her red eyes widen. She obviously knows why they’re here. “Please” she says. “please, no.”_

_“Mrs. Taylor, I’m DI Thursday, this is DC Morse. May we come in?”_

_Her lips quiver as she nods and steps aside._

_The man sitting at the kitchen table raises his head when they enter. “You found her, then.”_

_“We found a young woman we believe may be your daughter” Thursday answers smoothly, and Morse sees his eyes glide over the place, sees him take in the well-kept rooms, the pictures on the fireplace, Mary’s obviously in the place of pride._

_“I see. I suppose you want me to come with you?” He gets up. Richard, it said in the file, Richard Taylor, forty-nine, labourer. “I’ll go, Susan.”_

_She hasn’t said a word since she let them in. Her lips are still quivering, unshed tears behind her eyes, and Morse wonders if she’s saving them, saving them for the moment she knows for sure._

_They are silent on the way to the station. At the morgue, Doctor DeBryn has carefully covered the cuts on her chest and the strangulation mark on her throat with a blanket, and Morse reminds himself to buy hi9m a pint when this is over._

_“Take your time” the pathologist says gently, but Taylor shakes his head._

_“I don’t have to. That’s my – that’s my girl. That’s our little Mary.” Something like a suppressed sobs escape him and they all avert their eyes to give him a moment of privacy in his grief. Morse looks down on Mary Taylor, who a week ago was laughing and dancing and going to school with her friends. A few lines from Poe run through his head._

Come! Let the burial rite be read,  
The funeral song be sung  
An anthem for the queenliest dead  
that ever died so young.

 _It’s such a waste._

* * *

_They bring Mr. Taylor home soon afterwards. He asked to be the one to tell his wife, and to leave them alone for the night. He’s obviously not read to answer questions._

_“It’s always the same with cases like this” Thursday tells him eventually as he drives him home, “You ask yourself_ what if _.”_

_What if it was one of his own children._

_Morse wonders if anyone has cared for him like that since his mother died, then berates himself for it. This is no moment to feel bad for himself._

* * *

Morse can only stare as Mrs. Thursday walks back to the kitchen; eventually he forces himself to follow her and manages to ask, “Father?”

She throws a glance at the clock on the kitchen wall (confusedly, he thinks that he’s never realized how many clocks the Thursdays have. Morse has one, on his nightstand. His real one, not the one at Lonsdale.) “I know”. She sighs. “He’s been coming in later and later, this week. The case with those poor girls...”

The girls. Morse’s hearts beats faster. They solved that case. They solved that case yesterday.

“Another reason I’m glad you’re here. An after-dinner chat with you is just what the doctor ordered.”

She gives him the soft, caring smile he has seen on her face when she looks at Miss Thursday or Fred, and he doesn’t know what to do when it’s directed at him.

“Not that it’s my only reason. You really have to come over more often during the week, too.”

He nods because it seems like the best option. He has been doing that a lot since he woke up this morning.

When he sees she’s getting the plates to set the table – dinner seems to have been ready for quite some time – he moves to help her.

“Always the first to help, Dev. I wonder where your siblings can possibly –“

The door bangs open before he can register she called him Dev again, like Jerome invariably did, and Sam storms in. “Hey Mum, met Joanie in town, said she’ll come home around eight-ish, so she should be here any – Dev!”

And he’s treated to an enthusiastic hug. “You should have come sooner. Mum and Dad were talking about going to Lonsdale to drag you back home.”

“The porter would have enjoyed the spectacle” he somehow manages to reply. No one has hugged him like that since he last saw Joyce, and it has been a while.

“I dare say” Sam grins, “The way he always greets Mum... I think he has a bit of a crush on her.”

“Samuel Fred Thursday, instead of gossiping, you should help your brother, since he’s once again the one to set the table.”

“Yeah, yeah Mum” he answers, winking at Morse in that conspiring way siblings communicate. “He looks a bit tired anyway, he should sit down.”

“So you have noticed it too?”

And as she ushers him to a chair at the table and Sam winks at him again, Morse realizes that he successfully distracted her from coming home late by making her focus on his supposedly endangered health.

He and Joyce never did anything like that, but Gwen probably wouldn’t have cared about him enough to worry that much.

“I am quite alright, Mrs. – Mother” he hastily corrects himself.

She tuts. “And you think you are getting enough rest and food when you already address me formally after a week!” She reaches out and automatically brushes a lock of hair from his forehead, and the only thing that keeps him from flinching is the shock that makes it impossible to move for a second. “You’ll be calling Fred “sir” next.”

 _But I do_ , he wants to protest, and doesn’t, because nothing makes sense anymore.

“Me and Joanie used to joke you’d start that any day, when you got extra formal during puberty and would only read Dickens, remember that?” Sam asks, nudging him. Since Morse had no idea he only read Dickens during puberty, he can hardly share in his mirth.

“It would have been the correct thing to do at the time of Mr. Dickens.”

He laughs. “Ah, Dev, I missed you. Move back home.”

And there it is again, that word. _Home_. The word Mrs. Thursday used when she talked about Morse’s “father” the word they both throw around so effortlessly, as if it’s normal that it includes Morse as well.

He tells himself not to worry. Inspector Thursday and he just solved a case, a case that was as sick as that of Mason Gull; he can’t have forgotten or labour under the same delusions that his family seems to suffer from. And when Inspector Thursday tells them, they’ll have to believe him.

“Young man you just want him helping you with your grammar, like he did when you were both in school.”

Morse frowns. Why should he have to help Sam with his grammar? Sam has a job, and he plans to join the military, at least that’s what DI Thursday told him.

“Don’t look like that” Sam raises his hands. “I promise I never stray far from my dictionary, these days.”

“Good” Morse replies flatly, guessing that he’ll take his answer with a grain of salt.

He does, grinning brightly again in a second.

The door opens again and Morse, already fearing Miss Thursday, wishes he could just disappear. He should never have come.

“Hey Mum, Sam.”

“Joan” Mrs. Thursday calls out, “Look who’s here.”

“Dev came over?”

When she comes into the dining room, she gives both Morse and Sam a friendly hug, and to his own surprise, he feels almost... brotherly protective of her. It’s something he can’t quite put his finger on, something –

**“Mum!”**

**He’s out in the garden within seconds of hearing Joanie cry out, and breathes a sigh of relief when he sees she’s only scraped her knee.**

**She looks up to him, her eyes brimming with tears. “Dev –“**

**“Let me take a look” he kneels down next to the six-year-old, smiling gently at her. “I’m sure I can fix it.”**

Another one of those flashes, like the one he had in Lonsdale. Before he can get his bearings, the door opens again and Mrs. Thursday beams. “There he is.”

She goes to greet the DI, as always, Sam and Joan quickly following, and it takes Morse a moment to realize they expect him to do the same.

“Did Peter not want to step in?” Mrs. Thursday is asking as he walks through the door.

“Not today. He looked done in for, I sent him home.”

He looks at each of them in turn, clapping Sam’s and Morse’s shoulders. “Good to see you all together again.”

Morse’s heart sinks as he realizes.

Thursday doesn’t make a difference between the way he treats his own children and Morse, either.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys, hope this isn't too confusing. If it is, let me know!


	3. Dinner

_The interview of Mary Taylor’s parents and friends prove unfruitful, as was to be expected. A 16-year-old girl doesn’t tend to have enemies, or anyone who wishes her ill; and naturally she would have kept any older man she was involved with a secret._

_They have nothing._

_The whole station feels off, today. There is something about the death of someone so young, someone so full of potential that feels worse than everything else; not even Doctor DeBryn tries to cheer them up with one of his acerbic jokes when he gives them the autopsy report._

_“As expected. Time of death cannot be accurately determined, but it must have occurred within the last two or three days.”_

_He was right, then; Mary Taylor didn’t die immediately after she left her home. Whoever did this to her kept her somewhere._

_Morse can’t imagine what she must have gone through._

_“Also” DeBryn continues tensely, “She was a virgin up to the last day of her life.”_

_They all know what it means._

_“Any drugs in her system?” Thursday asks, but DeBryn shakes his head._

_“No, and she obviously hadn’t had food in a while. I would say a reasonably muscled attacker would count on the lack of nourishment and the obvious advantage most people would have had on her.”_

_“Didn’t even feed her, the bastard” Jakes mumbles and Morse can only agree, even if he doesn’t say so._

_“What about the symbols on her chest?” he asks instead, and the look Jakes bestows on him clearly states “Of course that’s all he cares about.”_

_“As we knew before, a pentagram and an infinity symbol... cut with a sharp knife. After her death, if t5hat’s any consolation. But other than that...”_

_“According to her parents, she had no interest in the occult or magic or anything like it” Thursday says._

_“If she had, she didn’t tell her friends either” Trewlove chimes in. There’s the end of that angle, then; what Shirly Trewlove doesn’t find is simply not there, as Morse well knows._

_“But then what does he want to tell us?” he muses._

_“Does he have to mean anything?” Jakes asks. “For all we know, he could just be mad. Why else would you cave that into a girl’s body?”_

_“It could still mean something to him” Morse replies absent-mindedly, staring at the pictures. He’s aware that they probably shouldn’t be talking of the killer as “he”, but he cannot imagine a woman doing something like this. “Infinity – never-ending darkness, maybe?”_

_“And how does this help us?”_

_“A theory right now would be most welcome, if you ask me” Thursday tells Jakes, a warning look in his eyes, but Morse is too used to the Sergeant’s comments to pay them much attention._

_“Lemniscate” he says abruptly._

_“Sorry, matey?” Strange, who has been silent until now, asks._

_“That’s what the infinity symbol is called. It derives from the ancient greek word for ribbons. It’s supposed to represent two snakes who are biting each other’s tails...”_

_“Of course it is.”_

_Morse bites his lip. This doesn’t feel right. No murder ever does, of course, but something about this..._

_“Any chance we’ve got another Mason Gull on our hands? Guy was crazy enough” Strange began._

_“Let’s hope not and concentrate on finding Mary Taylor’s killer” Thursday tries to be optimistic._

* * *

_Morse drives him home after another day without an new evidence, witnesses or information coming to light. Mary Taylor is still lying in the morgue, robbed of all the world was supposed to give her, and they have nothing, not even answer, to make amends to those left behind._

_“Might as well step in. Win will be glad to see you.”_

_“It’s not –“_

_“That wasn’t a question” Thursday studies him. “I can tell you’ve already stopped eating and resting properly, and that won’t help anybody.”_

_He’s never been able to explain that he simply can’t sit still when a case like this presents itself. A young girl, still a child, really, stricken down by some unknown hand, and with strange symbols on the crime scene... as Jakes would pit it, it’s up Morse’s alley. He should be able to –_

_He sighs and follows Thursday out the car and into his home. Mrs. Thursday is, as always, glad to see him. “Morse!”_

_“Good evening” he says politely, and he already knows how this will end._

_Of course he’s invited to dinner, and it is simply impossible to say no to Mrs. Thursday, he cleans his plate twice before they let him go._

_As he listens to Sam’s and Miss Thursday’s banter, he can’t help but wonder if this is what their family would have been like, if Mum hadn’t died so young. But no – no – as an adult, he can recall scenes that revealed the cracks in their marriage – no; Mum and Dad would never have sat like this, still happily married after twenty-six years, while their children were squabbling. And of course Gwen never liked it when he spoke up, at the dinner table or anywhere else, really._

_“Anyway, if you want me to come beat him up because he won’t leave you alone, I’ll gladly do it.”_

_“Thank you very much, Sam, but some girls can fight for themselves.”_

_“No one here is beating anyone up” Thursday declares, and Morse sees him sneak a glance at himself._

_One thing he knows for sure. He wouldn’t be the man he is today with such a family, and whether the thought causes more regret or relief, he can’t say._

_“Now when you get home, you get some rest” Thursday instructs him as he leads him to the door, after Morse has bidden the rest of the family goodbye. “And not too much to drink, do you hear?”_

_He nods, his eyes averted._

_Thursday sighs. “Just take care, Morse”. He lightly touches his shoulder and lets him go._

_Yes, with a father like Fred Thursday, a man wouldn’t have to be ashamed to look into a mirror._

“Here, Dev, take some more.”

“I thought you wanted to feed him up, Win, not fatten him up” Thursday remarks, his eyes sparkling with pride as he looks at them all.

This evening is both similar and yet starkly unlike any other Morse has spent under their roof. As part of the family, as they stubbornly continue to see him, he is expected to participate in the banter, the jokes, the laughter; to listen carefully and give suggestions and advice to his... younger siblings as he sees fit; and also, to annoy them now and then, it seems, since both Sam and Miss – Joan are determined to laugh at and be laughed at in return.

One thing that hasn’t changed, sadly, is the hat stand rule; Thursday doesn’t mention their case once, and Morse is desperate for news. But maybe... according to Mrs. – Mother – no, Mrs. Thursday – he’s supposed to talk to the DI after. Perhaps he can gain some information then.

“You’re pretty quiet today, Dev. Still busy translating Thucydides?” Thursday asks and he reminds himself that he’s supposed to engage in the conversation.

“Yes, s- yes, I am.” At least he can say as much. He saw the work lying on his desk when he went through his supposed rooms at Lonsdale.

Thursday chuckles. “For a second there, you looked as startled as on that first evening.”

That first evening?

It’s the worst possible time for one of the strange flashes he’s been having, so of course another occurs.

**“Here, Morse.”**

**“Please, Mrs. Thursday, I don’t mean to –“ He can’t deny that he’s still hungry, but he’s used to small portions at the orphanage. He’ll be fine. And if he eats too much, they might not invite him again.**

**“Now now, you’re a growing boy, you need to eat.”**

**“If it’s no problem –“ he begins, dubiously.**

**“Of course it isn’t. These two already eat more than enough, it doesn’t make a difference” Mr. Thursday says, but Morse can’t help but doubt that. Sam and Joan are only two and five years old after all, even though they’re pretty precocious for their age (Tommy Golding at the home would laugh at him for using such an important sounding word. He always does).**

**“Do you like to play?” Joan pipes up, looking at him with big eyes. Morse doesn’t know what their parents told them to explain why he’s here, but then, he himself isn’t quite sure how this happened.**

**“I do indeed like to play, but I don’t often have time to indulge” he tells her solemnly.**

**“What does that mean?”**

**“It means I don’t do it that often.”**

**She bites her lip. “But you’re not a grown up.”**

**“No.”**

**“Can we play a little after dinner, Mum, Dad, please?”**

**It surprises Morse that they immediately acquiesce, as if his presence is worth a treat.**

He’s by now learned that the flashes only take a few seconds so he quickly gets his bearings. “Sorry. The translation...”

“Always the same with you. You get so lost in your work, you forget everything else.”

“That’s what he’s got us for” Sam pipes up, grinning as usual. “Don’t you think he should be spending more time at home again, Dad?”

“I think I made it rather clear that your brother is not there for you to sound ideas off of.”

Sam bristles. “Why does everyone always think –“

“Because you tried to make him do your homework” Joan interrupts him.

“That was years ago! I was a child!”

“Yes, and look how grown up you all prove to be now” Thursday comments lightly, but Morse can tell from his tone that he doesn’t mean it scathingly. “Still, it’s true – we’re always glad to have you here, you know that.”

“Of course” he answers, his throat oddly dry. It’s been a long time since someone told him something like that. He doesn’t think anyone has truly been glad to see him since he and Susan broke it off.

He suddenly wonders if they were also engaged in this strange world. He is clearly single – albeit with more sense for interior design and taking better care of himself – but still.

Not that it matters. He’s certain that... whatever dream or hallucination he’s trapped in, it will end soon.

This doesn’t mean he won’t be working the case, however. He has to be doing something, and if _he’s_ still out there –

It’s at this moment that Morse realizes he can no longer recall the name of the suspect they arrested. He doesn’t know how he manages to stay clam – maybe because he has been forcing himself to be all day.

Once the table is cleared, Mrs. Thursday, Joan and Sam quickly disappear, the woman who believes herself to be Morse’s – adoptive mother? – only staying long enough to press his arm and whisper, “You know what to do. You always make him feel better in times like this.”

Morse doesn’t think he’s ever made anyone feel truly better in his life. But at least he knows Thursday’s favourite brandy, and that he always keep some in his home.

He himself pours himself a smaller glass than he wants, considering it likely that Thursday would notice if he indulged himself. He’s proven right when he hands him his glass and he warns, “Be careful, now. I don’t want to have to bring you to bed again.”

“That was one time!”

The answer, so reminiscent of Sam’s at the dinner table, comes unbidden and automatic, and Thursday chuckles. “I know. Well, you won’t be the worse off for knowing what a hangover feels like, I always say.”

So he does drink less here. Morse supposes it’s good news.

After they’re both seated, he hesitates. He has no idea how this son Thursday knows would speak to him. “Father”. The word feels foreign on his tongue. “Mother said you were having problems at work, and –“

“Knew why she had ordered you here.” For a second, he smiles, then his expression drops. “Another girl went missing this morning. It’s the fourth.”

Morse’s heart starts beating faster.

He may no longer recall the name of the murderer, but of one thing he is absolutely sure.

He had claimed the lives of three victims when they arrested him.


	4. Different Beginnings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope everything's still clear. Enjoy!

“That’s awful“ he says, although it’s hardly appropriate to describe his feelings.

Thursday nods. “And her poor parents...” he shakes his head. “When I imagine it could be our Joanie...”

“Joan’s safe” he says softly. “She’s... too old for him.”

“So you did read all about the case in the papers. Should have known.”

“Don’t I always?” he guesses.

“I hoped you’d be too busy, these days.”

“It’s hardly easy to overlook.”

“At least Dorothea Frazil – you remember her? She’s doing a good job. Nothing too sensational.”

“Yes, I do remember Miss Frazil” he replies. Apparently they are only passing acquaintances here. He supposes there was no reason for them to meet and befriend one another, seeing as he’s working at the university instead of the police station.

“She’s respectful. That’s more than one can say about most of them.” Thursday takes a sip from his glass and sighs. “The truth is, we have three bodies, one girl missing, and not one shred of evidence.”

“But certainly doctor DeBryn has done the autopsies?”

“Oh yes, and as usual he’s giving it his all. But what am I saying – they all do. Doctor DeBryn, Jakes, Strange, Trewlove –“

Morse wonders if he knows them in this other life, and then with a pang he realizes that Jakes must be Thursday’s uncontested bagman.

But then, he’s closer to him than Jakes could ever be now, isn’t he? Or at least the “Dev” they all address constantly is.

Maybe this is a parallel universe. He read a theory about them, once, almost immediately discarding it, since one universe full of unsolvable problems was quite enough for him.

“Tell me what’s going on in that big brain of yours. It usually helps” Thursday prompts and he swallows, deciding to take the chance.

“In the papers, there were hints of – markings” he says carefully. “on the bodies.”

“We couldn’t keep it a secret, of course. Thing like this in a town like Oxford...”

“What kind of markings?” he insists. “Maybe I can help –“

“It’s not really your area of expertise, I’m afraid.”

“Still” Morse shrugs, “You’d be surprised how often I’ve been treated to a lecture that has nothing to do with Latin or Greek at lunch”.

Thursday smiles. “Don’t you remember when Jerome did the same to me the other day?”

Jerome. They are close, then, close enough that he knows Morse’s family. No. Not _his_ family. Tempting as it is to give into the fantasy, if only for a while, he knows who he is, and who the Thursdays are; and that, when it comes down to it, he doesn’t deserve to be their son and brother.

“He loves to hear himself talk.”

“I’d say we have the only professor in Oxford in the family who doesn’t. Is everything alright at work?”

“Of course. Why?”

Morse forces himself to meet Thursday’s shrewd gaze. Naturally he has noticed something is the matter with him. If what he believes is true, then this Thursday raised him as his own; he would immediately realize he’s not the same. “You were awfully quiet at dinner, even for you. And you didn’t even react when Sam and Joanie made jokes about Wagner.”

Should he tell him the truth? But would he believe him? “Just tired. Mother was right – I probably shouldn’t spend all day at lectures or with my books.”

“She usually is. Just take care not to lose any more weight, or she’ll make the porter bring you sandwiches again. How is Pinter, by the way?”

“He enjoyed telling me I had to come to dinner a bit too much.”

“I can imagine that.” After a pause, he continues, resigned, “Win’s really worried for me then, isn’t she.”

“You know her. And we all are.” Words he would never have dared saying out loud otherwise. His loyalty to Thursday runs deeper than most bagmen’s to their superior officers, he knows only too well; but he could, would never let him know; here, though, where he owes him not just the interest of a colleague, but the care of a son –

“You all worry too much about your old man. I’ll be fine.”

Old man. His nickname at the station, and how he chooses to describe himself. Only back at the station, he isn’t known as their old man; no, that belongs to his family, to the people he cares for and loves. Morse is a cuckoo in the nest, shouldn’t be here, has no right to be here. Even this – this talk when the others have gone upstairs speaks of a closeness he doesn’t think he ever truly shared with his own father. He can’t even say if he did with Mum. It’s been so long.

He takes a sip of his brandy, surprised at the burn. He should be sued to it by now. Or maybe not.

“What about the markings?” he asks.

Thursday sighs. “An infinity symbol and a pentagram, cut into each of their chests after they died. Max DeBryn called the infinity symbol something else – a –“

“Lemniscate?”

“Yes. Apparently it’s used in various cultures. Could mean anything.”

“It’s certainly complicated” he says.

“You can say that again, but if I’d wanted an easy job, I would have done so. Got an earful from your grandfather when I told him I wanted to go to the police, too.”

Grandfather. Morse never knew his grandparents. To imagine that here, he was included in all family activities –

He still doesn’t quite understand how they ended up here, however. He knows the Thursdays moved to Oxford after the war, when Sam and Joan were small children. But at the same time, he knows he grew up in Lincolnshire, and that he only made it to Oxford when he went to university.

“You’ll get him” he eventually says because he has to say something. “You always do.”

“I hope so.” Thursday empties his glass. “You’ll stay the night? I’d rather not have any of you out on the streets in the dark until we catch the bastard.”

He nods. To his shock, Thursday reaches out and ruffles his hair. “Always knows what’ll make me feel better, Win does. Thanks, Dev.”

He’s glad they go upstairs soon after.

As he tries to go to sleep in a room he apparently shared with Sam, since the younger Thursday is already asleep in the other bed, his thoughts return to the question how, even taking a parallel universe into account, he could ever have ended up here.

An hour later, he’s still awake. There’s a book on the bedside table. Tennyson’s poems. He picks it up and opens it. On the first page he can read two words in a scrawl he knows, black in the moonlight.

_Endeavour Thursday._

He closes the book and forces himself to lie down again. Sleep eventually comes, and dreams with it.

**“Say goodbye to Endeavour, Joycie.”**

**“But where is he going?”**

**Gwen smiles, without warmth or humour. “He’s going to go away for a while.”**

**Morse knows better. Here he is, standing in his father’s house for the last time. Gwen finally convinced him that it would be “better for the boy” if they brought him somewhere “so people can take better care of him.”**

**If it had been the other way around, if Mum had had to take Joyce in upon marrying Dad, she would never have sent her away.**

**Joyce hugs him tightly. “Will you write to me?”**

**“Of course” he lies. Any letter he wrote wouldn’t reach her, Gwen would make sure of it. He’s being kicked out of his home, his family, and he’s never supposed to come back or contact them again.**

**Dad didn’t even tell him goodbye before he left for his shift. He just looked at him and shrugged.**

**“I’ll miss you, Endeavour.”**

**“I’ll miss you too, Joycie” he says quietly. It’s the one true thing he’s said all day.**

**Gwen all but drags him out of the house as Joyce waves. He waves back, knowing he’ll never see his little sister again.**

**“Come on.”**

**Oxford, she said. A “home for children who don’t have one” in Oxford. Morse is convinced she simply went to see how far away she could send him with the money they have.**

**“Don’t expect to come home for Christmas, or your birthday, or something silly like that.”**

**“No Gwen.”**

**“And now be a good boy and get on the train. They are sending someone to pick you up.”**

**“Yes Gwen.”**

**“Alright, then.”**

**She turns and leaves without a goodbye as well, but he didn’t expect one.**

**Nobody pays attention to the twelve-year-old riding the train, travelling farther away from everything he ever knew with each passing second. He tries to read – at least Gwen let him keep his books. He left all his toys to Joyce. He hardly thinks there’ll be a lot of chances to play at the home.**

**As it turns out, he has to wait in Oxford, standing on the platform, feeling tears burn behind his eyes, tears of shame, tears of fear, tears of loneliness. But he won’t cry. He has to be brave. For Mum.**

**The man who eventually comes to get him doesn’t introduce himself, just tells him to follow him. He complies.**

**Mrs. Price at the orphanage – for that, Morse soon learns, is what the “home” Gwen spoke of is – barely raises her eyes when he enters her office, simply tells him to go find a bed in the dormitory and “get to know the others.”**

**He vows to himself to try his best.**

* * *

**Morse doesn’t like the orphanage. Most of the children are either way too small for him to talk to (and Mrs. Price, apparently prejudiced against all boys, won’t let him play with the girls, and he’d really like to talk one dark-haired five-year-old because she reminds him of Joyce) or are almost grown-up troublemakers, especially Tommy Brandon.**

**He was the one who informed Morse gleefully on his first day that no one would adopt a boy over ten years old and “not a weird one like you, anyway.”**

**As if he didn’t already know.**

**He’s been here six months, he will turn thirteen soon, and when people come to talk to the children and see if one of them might be the right fit for their families, they don’t even look his way. He keeps to himself and reads on such days, even though Mrs. Price makes him stay in the common room.**

**Today though, something’s different. A man and a woman are talking to Mary (the one who looks like Joyce; despite Mrs. Price’s misgivings, Morse has managed to play with her on a number of occasions, and her laughter made him think even more of his sister) – that’s normal enough; but there’s another couple standing a few feet away, watching the exchange, not trying to talk to any of the other children. The man hasn’t even taken off his hat, which strikes Morse as somewhat impolite if they’re here to adopt.**

**Maybe they need help. His mother told him to always be helpful. He carefully marks the page of his book, then gets up.**

**He steps up to them and clears his throat. “Excuse me, may I help you? Are you looking for Mrs. Price’s office?”**

**The woman smiles at him and he’s struck by the likeness to his mother, even though she looks completely different. It must be the warmth of her smile. “No, thank you, dear. We’re only here for moral support.”**

**“Friend and colleague and his wife” the man says, nodding towards the couple talking to Mary. Morse wonders where he works.**

**“Mary’s a very good girl” he ventures, hoping to help her to a nice home. He’ll miss her, but he’s gotten used to seeing children leave. He and the other old ones are the only ones who are staying.**

**The woman’s still smiling at him. “And what’s your name?”**

**“Morse.”**

**“Morse? Nothing else?”**

**He looks away and nods.**

**“What are you reading?” the man suddenly asks and he wordlessly presents him with the book. He’s hardly ever asked that question.**

**“Kipling?” the man asks.**

**Maybe he thinks it’s too grown up for him. Mrs. Price does. “My mother gave it to me” he apologizes, only realizing that he’s at an orphanage and that therefore, they cannot fail to come to the right conclusion when he winces.**

**“Must have known she had a smart lad” he then instantly recovers. Morse is impressed. Whatever job he has, it must require sharp thinking.**

**“I –“ he begins, unsure of how to proceed, when Mrs. Price calls out, “Endeavour! Are you harassing those people?”**

**He warily watches her hurry over, her hands fluttering. “I’m very sorry. Endeavour, go and take out the trash.”**

**He has become something like her go-to maid. He assumes it’s because he doesn’t dare protest.**

**“He’s really not doing anything” the man says sharply. “We were just having a nice chat, weren’t we, lad?”**

**“He was telling us about Kipling” the woman chimes in. “It’s nice to find a young boy who reads. I hope our Sam will like it too when he grows up.”**

**Whoever Sam is, boy or girls, they are lucky. Must be with parents who want them to read. Morse knows that because his Mum liked him to read, too.**

**Mrs. Price looks at them, obviously confused. “Yes, well –“**

**“As a matter of fact” the man says, “We were just about to sit down so we can talk more comfortably, weren’t we, Morse?”**

**He calls him Morse, other than Mrs. Price, who insists on calling him Endeavour, no matter how many times he asks her not to.**

**He knows he’ll probably regret it later when she gives him more chores, but nods.**

**The man holds out his hand. “Fred Thursday. This is my wife, Win.”**

**Morse shakes his hand. It’s warm and firm.**


	5. Suspect

Dev wakes up slowly and content, as always when he stays the night at his parents‘. Sam’s well-known snores fill his ears and he suppresses a smile. Perhaps he can get him to help paint the garden shed later, Mother has asked him forever to –

Morse sits up, the fantasy slipping away. What just happened? For a second, he was as convinced this was real, this was his true life, as the Thursdays seem to be convinced it is. He swallows, looking at Sam who is blissfully unaware to what is going on. He has to concentrate, he can’t allow himself to –

**“Sam, Mother says you have to wake up.”**

**A snore.**

**“Sam.”**

**Another snore.**

**“Don’t make me get the sponge again.”**

**The sixteen-year-old grumbles and cracks an eye open. “You wouldn’t.”**

**“You know I would.”**

**“You’re no fun” he complains, but gets up.**

**“Breakfast is ready.”**

**He grins. “You could have told me that!”**

**“And here I thought you would get up to do your big brother a favour –“**

**He sticks out his tongue. “Don’t act so high and mighty just because you have a degree, Dev.”**

Morse shakes his head, telling himself none of this ever happened.

And yet – the dream. It felt so real. And part of him can easily believe that Gwen wanted nothing more than to turn him out of the house.

“Morning, Dev. You got lost in your head again?”

He turns to look at Sam. “Seems like it.”

He shakes his head. “High time for a weekend at home.”

“Does this mean you’ll help me paint the shed?” He figures he might as well play along – while it might get difficult to keep a firm grasp on what’s real and what’s not, at least he doesn’t have to cause the Thursdays any amount of pain, although he hardly believes anyone would be sad to learn that he’s not really part of their family.

Sam sighs. “You won’t let me off the hook?”

“I let you off the hook the last two times we were here, which is why the shed isn’t painted yet.” Again, he didn’t mean to say it and doesn’t know where the words came from in the first place.

“Fine. But Mum better make us stew and dumplings for that.”

“You know she will.”

They get dressed – Morse finding a few clothes that are presumably his in the closet, only they are better ironed than his ever were, like DI Thursday or Sam’s or Joan’s – and walk downstairs. Joan and Mrs. Thursday are already up.

“We decided to let Fred rest for a bit. He’s had a terrible week.”

An understatement. Morse doesn’t even want to imagine the man they caught still running around, keeping another girl captive.

But he has to. He can’t help but feel that the two cases – he suddenly waking up in another life, and the killer still at large – are connected. It sounds insane, but then, what choice does he have? If he’s in a coma, or if this is a dream, he shows no signs of waking up, and maybe following the clues will eventually make him do so. And if it’s not – if this is –

He decides he’d rather not wonder if this is real or not.

“Dev said we’re supposed to paint the shed” Sam says, looking contrite but resigned to the task at hand.

“Oh don’t be such a spoilsport, I’ll help too” Joan says brightly and Morse can’t help but smile.

“Thanks Joanie.” Joanie? Yesterday, he had trouble calling her by her first name. But yesterday was before that dream. Where DI and Mrs. Thursday apparently took pity on a small boy who’d been thrown in an orphanage –

He won’t allow himself to dwell on it.

“You’ll have to change clothes though, no reason to ruin your nice ones with paint” Mrs. Thursday says as she serves them breakfast. Morse tried to set the table again but was ordered to sit down while Sam and Joan did it.

“Who’s ruining their clothes now?”

DI Thursday, Morse registers with relief, looks much better than yesterday.

“The children are going to painting the shed.”

“Of course they are, Dev’s here.”

“I heard that criticism” Sam declares.

“You were supposed to.”

“Just because I am not good with my hands –“

“You’re at the college for technology” Joan reminds him.

Oh. So that’s why he’s here and not going to join the military. Morse can’t quite figure out why that particular detail has changed, but at least he can pretend he knows about his studies, now.

“And what about a paint brush is particularly technological?”

Morse sips his tea.

“Good call” Thursday tells him. The phone rings. Sighing, he gets up. “I’ll take it.”

Morse’s blood runs cold, and it’s easy to see that the rest of the family is just as worried as he is, but it turns out to be someone called “Aunt May” who Morse guesses he’s supposed to know.

He can’t ask, so he concentrates on getting through the day. He paints the shed with Sam and Joan, who quickly make a game out of who can splatter the other with more paint, which he believes is something many siblings would do; he stays for dinner as a matter of course, since Mrs. Thursday won’t let him leave; and when he positively declares that he would rather sleep at Lonsdale since tomorrow is Monday, they all accompany him to the door.

“Now, don’t let that many days pass until we hear from you again, alright?” she asks, drawing him into a hug. It has been a long time since he got hugged by a mother.

“I promise” he says weakly.

Thursday clasps his shoulder. “And remember what I told you yesterday; don’t worry about me.”

“We’ll look after him when you aren’t there” Joan whispers as she too gives him a quick hug, Sam contending himself with a punch on his shoulder.

Then, he leaves them behind, carrying sandwiches Mrs. Thursday positively insisted he take.

_It’s been three days since Mary Taylor’s body was found, and they still have no clue who they are looking for. Today, Morse and Thursday are going to talk to an expert in the occult – naturally a professor at Lonsdale, Frederick Lestrange – and try and see if perhaps there is something more to the symbols after all._

_“Ever come across him, when you were there?” Thursday asks on the way. He rarely mentions his time at college, unlike some of his other colleagues._

_“No. But then, I was reading the Greats.”_

_“Wouldn’t have had much to do with him” Thursday agrees. “Well, let’s see if it’s just another Oxford don full of himself or if he can actually help.”_

_Morse doubts it. At this point they are grasping at straws. But there is no point in mentioning it; Thursday knows it as well as he does._

_Bright has received several impatient calls from the Chief Constable already. Although what exactly he is supposed to do if they don’t find the killer soon, Morse has no idea. He can hardly fire or demote them all. Not that there would be much need of demoting, when it comes to him._

_Some days, he’s still not sure the police is the right place for him, but then he’s never felt truly comfortable anywhere._

_The porter at Lonsdale, a new one Morse doesn’t know but who leads them to Professor Lestrange’s rooms with an expression that clearly states he thinks he is above such simple work, makes a few smart comments about the police force as he does so, and Morse can see Thursday’s jaw tighten. The last thing they need right now is anyone losing their temper and so he quickly informs him he used to belong to Londsale, but dripped out. Just like he expected, the man’s ire then proceeds to descend on him._

_He doesn’t think Thursday noticed, but right before they enter the office, he squeezes his forearm._

_Lestrange is a strong, tall man in what could still be comfortable described as his middle age. He stands up as they walk towards his desk. “Good morning.”_

_“Good morning, Professor. DI Thursday, this is DC Morse. In one of our investigations, there have been some clues that we think might pertain to your subject.”_

_He raises an eyebrow. “That sounds rather concerning.”_

_“Would you allow us to ask you a few questions?”_

_“Of course.” He leans forward and lowers his voice. “Is it about that poor girl that was found a few days ago?”_

_The case has been all over the newspapers, of course. Morse hasn’t read a single article. He knows enough about the case._

_Thursday nods._

_Lestrange takes a deep breath. “A tragedy. So young... to be robbed of all of life’s chances...”_

_It’s similar to what Morse thought. Maybe it’s a Lonsdale thing._

_And maybe he’s just having very stupid thoughts because they haven’t made progress._

_“Here” Thursday passes him the pictures. “These were carved into her chest.”_

_He studies them carefully. “You are aware what they are?”_

_Morse quickly tells him. He tilts his head to the side. “You’ve done your research.”_

_“I went to Lonsdale myself” he replies quickly._

_He smiles. “Ah, that explains it.” He lays the picture down on the table and sighs. “I – “ He stops talking then, and looks away._

_“Professor?” Thursday prompts._

_“I would lie if I said this didn’t look familiar” he finally continues slowly, walking to his bookshelf without looking at them and taking out a large volume. “If you don’t mind me asking, Constable Morse, what exactly did you study during your time here?”_

_“Reading Greats.”_

_“You would hardly have come across this, then.” He hands him a book that’s clearly old, the bindingall but falling apart, and he handles it with care._

_Le grande Grimoire._

_“No” he answers. “Is there a connection to the case?”_

_Another sigh. “I am afraid so.”_

_Lestrange opens the book and points at a page where infinity symbols and pentagrams are painted over and over. Morse and Thursday glance at one another. “And what that’s good for?” the DI asks._

_“I know how this may sound to someone more... bound to the goings on of day-to-day life, Inspector, but while no one is quite sure what information this page is supposed to impart, we know that it is full of rituals.”_

_“Rituals”. Thursday sounds incredulous, and Morse has to agree with him. Being a student at Oxford is one thing; being made enough to believe such things quite another. “You are saying someone out there killed a young girl to perform some sort of ritual.”_

_“I am saying it is possible. I hope not.”_

_There is too much vehemence behind that last sentence for them not to catch up to it. “What do you mean?”_

_“I don’t – he’s a little odd, you see, but I never –“_

_“Who, Professor?”_

_“Herman. Herman Hardy. He’s one of my students. He’s spent the last semester working on the grande grimoire... To the point where I got a little worried about his obsessive behaviour, you see.”_

_Thursday nods grimly. “What can you tell us about him?”_

_“He’s a prodigy. Brilliant. Actually one of the best students I ever had. But he lost his parents early, and you know what that can do to a clever bit fragile mind.”_

_Morse keeps his eyes on Lestrange so he won’t see Thursday’s reaction to these words._

_“And there is something else... He is scared of many things spells and rituals were supposed to protect us from in bygone times. For example, despite his intelligence he believes in ghost. And he is scared to die. Terrified. He won’t even attend funerals – which the whole school learned about when one of our old fellows died. He was about the only student who didn’t go.”_

_“Where can we find him?”_

_“At this time of the day, he should be in his room.”_

_The porter shows them the way again, of course, meaning they can’t talk about Hardy in front of him. There’s already enough gossiping going on at universities in general, they don’t have to add to it._

_Hardy calls out for them to enter as soon as Thursday knocks._  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like it? Please let me know :)


	6. Changing Tides

As Morse walks down the street to Lonsdale – DI Thursday made him promise that he’d be careful, despite there being no reason for it since he’s hardly the killer’s type – he tries to remember. Yes. They did go to see Lestrange, and then they visited Hardy...

“Good evening, Mr. Thursday!” Pinter beams. It was one thing to read the name _Endeavour Thursday_ in a book; it’s another to be addressed as such, but he manages to react with a polite greeting.

“I hope your family is doing well?”

“Very well, thank you.”

“I see your dinner has been taken care of” he says, indicating the sandwich in his hands. “Enjoy it while it lasts, Mr. Thursday.”

“I will.” What a strangely fitting advice.

Only that he can’t allow himself to enjoy it. God knows if he’d come back from another slip up like this morning.

His rooms are as he left them. He’s barely made it out of his coat (which he donned on despite the heat and Mrs. Thursday’s protests) when the phone rings.

“Hello Dev, just wanted to make sure you made it home alright.”

“I did, Father.” It still feels weird to call Thursday his father, but he expects it. They talk for a bit – the usual gossip between family members that Morse should be privy to but isn’t, and the conversation takes a lot of concentration.

The strangest part is that Thursday seems to take his time because he likes talking to him, hearing his voice. As a father should and would, unless he be like Morse’s.

By the time they hang up, there’s a lump in his throat and he wants nothing more than a drop of brandy, but there’s none in the entire flat. Naturally.

Someone knocks on his door and he finds Jerome Hogg holding up a bottle of red wine. “Thought we could use a night kip.”

His initial reaction is to decline politely, but on the other hand... he needs to know more about this life, what is expected of him.

“You’ve lost that haunted look about your eyes” Jerome comments. “It was a good idea to spend the weekend at home.”

Thinking of the flashes of a life he hasn’t lived, the strange dream he had last night and his confusion upon waking, he’s not sure that’s as good a thing as Jerome thinks it is.

He quickly changes the subject. Between Jerome’s gossiping and a few innocuous questions, he soon comes to the conclusion that he seems to be a respected member of the faculty, especially renowned for his knowledge of Ancient Greek; and apparently he’s well-liked as well, which is not something he ever expected to be.

“And how’s the Thucydides coming along?” he asks.

“About as well as can be expected.”

“Ah. Finished soon and perfectly at that, I dare say.”

“You’re one to talk. What about you and your Varro?” Again words drip from his lips that he would never speak out loud normally, and in a decidedly flirty tone that he’s noticed Jerome use with his close friends.

“Oh, I’m afraid we’ve had a bit of a fight. A slight difference between grammatical points in the scripts, you know.”

He winces in sympathy.

All in all, it is a nice evening. Jerome doesn’t appear to be the bad gossip he remembers – or at least there’s nothing malevolent or particularly grating about it; and at least he got some information out of it.

Morse dreads going to sleep that night. What if he should mistake himself for Endeavour Thursday again? And what if the dream returns? He knows he has no choice but to rest, but he can’t help but wish once more for a proper drink.

Not that it would help him much in this world, according to Thursday at least, one proper glass of whiskey would probably be enough to knock him out, and he can’t risk that.

So eventually he forces himself to go to his unfamiliar bed and somehow manages to drift off.

**Morse decides that evening that he liked talking to Mrs. and Mr. Thursday. They seemed actually interested in what he had to say, and more importantly, they were nice.**

**Not many people have been nice to him since Mum died.**

**The couple the Thursdays accompanied that day return a few times, but they never do. He didn’t expect them to. Sometimes, though, he looks back somewhat wistfully to the moment when they complimented him on reading. It felt good.**

**Eventually, they adopt Mary. On the day they come to pick her up, Morse goes to the common room as well, even though it’s not one of the days visitors usually drop by; he wants to wave her goodbye, although he probably won’t be allowed to speak to her. She’ll forget him soon enough.**

**She’s wearing her best dress and smiling from ear to ear, and he wonders what it must feel like to be wanted. He remembers being loved by Mum, of course, but a whole family wishing to make you one of their own...**

**“Morse!” she squeals. “Can I say goodbye, Mummy?”**

**The woman is beaming at being addressed such and tells her of course. Morse quickly steps forward; he doesn’t want to risk her running and perhaps falling and ruining her dress on such an important day for her. He catches her.**

**“Morse, I got adopted!”**

**“I can tell” he smiles. “What’s your new last name?”**

**“Miles!”**

**“Mary Miles. That’s a good name.”**

**“I think so too!” She bites her lip. “I asked, but they said they only wanted a girl.”**

**Oh. She asked whether she could take him with. For the first time since he came here, he has to blink away tears. “That’s quite alright. I’m fine here.”**

**“But don’t you want a mummy and daddy?”**

**“Don’t worry about me” he tells her, kissing her forehead, feeling guilty for lying to her by omission.**

**“So you’re the one Fred talked about” Mr. Miles says suddenly and he looks up as he puts Mary down.**

**“Yes, sir.”**

**He looks him up and down and hums. “You’re polite.”**

**“And super nice!” Mary chimes in, jumping up and down.**

**Mr. Miles chuckles. “All the better.”**

**Morse doesn’t quite understand what he means by that.**

* * *

**A week passes. He can’t say if he misses Mary for herself or for looking at her and seeing Joyce, and he feels horrible about that. He mostly stays by himself and reads – so really, nothing’s changed – and on Visiting Day he doesn’t want to go to the common room. Until now he at least had the pleasure to watch Mary talk to her new parents.**

**Mrs. Price won’t let him stay in the dormitory, of course, and so he takes the Kipling again and hides in a corner, as he is wont to do.**

**He forgets all around him, glad to take a break from this world and instead get lost in Mowgli’s, until someone nudges his foot. “Morse, they want you.”**

**He looks up to see Bertie, one of the nicer boys, eight years old. “Sorry?”**

**Bertie nods shyly towards the door and he’s surprised to find the Thursdays standing there, together with two small children who he guesses are their own.**

**His first thought is that something terrible has happened and that they are nice enough to tell him in person. So instead of a greeting the first thing he asks is, “Is Mary okay?”**

**Mr. Thursday blinks. “Yes. She’s settling in well in her new home.”**

**Morse breathes a sigh of relief. It doesn’t explain what they are doing here, though. Certainly they are not like Gwen? And even if they were, they wouldn’t abandon their own children here? “Hello, Mrs. Thursday” he says. “Sorry for not greeting you before. I was worried.”**

**“It’s no problem” she replies, smiling, “On the contrary, we’re sorry for worrying you.”**

**No adult except for Mum has ever apologized to him.**

**She nudges the two children. “Joan, Sam, this is Morse. Remember when we told you about him?”**

**They look at him with big eyes, then the girl takes courage and steps forward. “Hi. I’m Joan.”**

**“So I gathered”. He shakes her hand solemnly.**

**“Mum said you were a big boy, but you’re not that big at all.”**

**“Joanie” Mr. Thursday says mildly.**

**“It’s alright, sir. I am quite aware that I am not of average height for my age.”**

**“The sir is really not necessary, Morse.”**

**Sam says something that’s a bit too fast for Morse to catch and he leans down to ask him to repeat it. As it turns out, he’d like to draw with him at one of the tables, and Joan jumps at the chance to do the same.**

**It’s not a bad afternoon by any means. The children are pretty smart and well raised, and they seem to like Morse. He doesn’t think he’ll ever get tired of being liked. It happens to seldom.**

**Granted, he doesn’t quite understand why Mr. and Mrs. Thursday are content to stay near them and only now and then ask a question or make a remark, but every time he looks up from the paper Sam is colouring with his help, they’re smiling at them, so he supposes he’s doing something right.**

* * *

 

**After that, the Thursdays come to visit him on a regular basis. Sometimes they take the children who soon run towards him once they enter the room, sometimes there’s only the two of them.**

**The first time Mr. Thursday comes alone, Morse feels a little intimidated. He’s only ever seen him in Mrs. Thursday’s company, and he doesn’t know what to say at first.**

**It’s warm out, so the go into the orphanage garden.**

**“Wanted to chat with you for a bit, and some things aren’t meant for small ears” he says conversationally after they’ve sat down on a bench.**

**Morse assumes there are many things the Thursdays don’t let Joan and Sam hear yet. They’re good parents.**

**“Have you ever wondered what I do for a living?”**

**Morse nods. He has, but didn’t think it was polite to ask.**

**“I’m a police officer. DS, for now.”**

**“So you solve murder cases?” Morse, who studies the paper whenever Mrs. Price happens to leave it lying around, asks.**

**“Sometimes, yes.”**

**“That sounds interesting.”**

**“Mostly it’s a bloody chore” he replies, but the slight smile playing around his lips makes Morse believe that he does actually like his job. “Point is, I am curious. Always have been. And recently, when we came to visit you, Mrs. Price made a few allusions to your father.”**

**He doesn’t want to talk about Dad, but the Thursdays have been nice to him. Visiting days are so much more pleasant since he has some visitors himself. And so he begins to speak.**

**He tells Mr. Thursday – no, DS Thursday – all about Mum and Dad and how they fought for months before they divorced, and how he never knew he had a baby sister until after Mum’s death when he was sent to Dad and Gwen, and how he never even told him goodbye.**

**He doesn’t realize he’s finally started crying about it all like a little boy until Thursday pulls him towards him. “There, there, Morse. They’re not worth your tears.” He sniffles and tries to calm himself down, sheepishly takes the handkerchief he gives him.**

**“I’m sorry.”**

**“Never apologize for crying. I see it often enough in my work to have learned that.” Then he mutters something under his breath that to Morse sounds like “bloody cow and damn asshole”. He clears his throat. “I have to apologize. I didn’t mean to insult your father or your stepmother.”**

**Morse smiles, his cheeks still a bit wet. “That’s alright. I am not very positively inclined towards them myself for the time being.”**

**Thursday throws his head back and laughs. “You’re a bit of a weird one, aren’t you, Morse?”**

**He doesn’t know what to reply to that, or if it’s supposed to be an insult or not.**

**“But, lad, I wouldn’t have you any other way. Neither would Win or the kiddies.”**

**Morse thinks this is one of the biggest compliments he’s ever received.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry to bother anyone, just - please tell me if you like this? Please?


	7. Strategy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your kind comments, they really kept me going!

This time, he doesn’t wake up completely immersed into this strange new world he was thrown in such a short time ago; instead, it’s an open struggle between Dev Thursday, Fellow Associate at Lonsdale, holding on to his family and his memories, and Morse, Oxford copper, who knows what’s real and what’s not. Morse makes it out because of his conviction that he’s right, but how often will he manage to do that?

He sits up. It’s still in the middle of the night, close to 4 pm, but he doesn’t dare to go back to sleep. He doesn’t need more false memories.

The problem, he reflects, as he settles in front of his desk, is that they don’t feel wrong or false. They feel true. He can easily imagine the Thursdays growing attached to a boy they meet at the orphanage, and he has no problem imagining the rest.

No. No, he can’t let himself imagine things now, too. Otherwise he’ll grow too confused, and waking up will become even more of a chore than it is.

He has to remember.

He grabs a piece of paper and inserts it in the typewriter. The already typed-out pages lying next to it prove that Dev Thursday is more adept at handling it than Constable Morse ever was, but what needs to be done needs to be done.

And so he starts typing.

_Oxford, 1967_

_My name is E. Morse. I am a Detective Constable. I work at –_

Writing it down will hopefully help him remember, will make him realize –

_The case we were working on was another one of those Mason Gull predicted there would be more of –_

The last thing Morse wanted was for Mason Gull to be right, then.

And yet, here they are, and he tries and tries to remember what happened next.

_Herman Hardy is... small. It’s the first thing that pops into his head, since he’s not the tallest man himself, and the student barely reaches Morse’s shoulders._

_“Yes?” he looks at them, eyes blinking behind thick glasses. “What is it? I’m busy.”_

_His room looks like many would claim a normal student’s room looks like – thrown into complete and utter chaos by an occupant who couldn’t care less. There are papers and books everywhere, not to mention countless empty cups that must have contained tea at one point. Morse would probably feel annoyed if it didn’t have too much in common with  his flat, if one replaced the tea cups with empty bottles._

_“Mr. Hardy, we’re DI Thursday and DC Morse, Oxford City Police” Thursday introduces himself, “We’d like to ask you a few questions.”_

_“What about? I can’t imagine anything I have to say warranting you talking to me.”_

_He would make a good don, Morse reflects sarcastically. At least many of those he remembers treated him just like that._

_“Mr. Hardy, a young girl was murdered.”_

_“I read about it in the papers.” If he cares even a little bit about Mary Taylor and how she died, he certainly doesn’t show it._

_“Two strange symbols were found at the crime scene –“_

_It’s then that he grows excited. “Symbols? What symbols?”_

_He could be interested because he has been studying symbols for quite some time – God knows the priorities of some academics can grow rather strange over time –  or because they found his handiwork. It’s hard to tell._

_“Let me see!”_

_Thursday wordlessly shows him the picture, the pinch of his brow easily telling Morse that he is far from impressed by a man who would rather stare at a photo than reflect even for a second on the young life that was crushed a few days ago._

_“It’s called Lemis–“_

_“We know that, Mr. Hardy” Thursday tells him, “We already talked to Professor Lestrange.” He doesn’t mention Morse this time, or why they already knew; it’s another of his tricks to get a better grasp of the subject, but Hardy doesn’t really react to them having the information, rather he shakes his head contemptuously at the name Lestrange being mentioned._

_Something in Morse bristles. He knows the type to well, the one who, while sucking up to their superiors in private – hence probably why Lestrange considers him brilliant – while thinking little of them in private, and he has never liked them. True, some people would say that he desperately needs to learn to hide his feelings better, but at least those he truly respects always know he does._

_“I see. What did he tell you?”_

_“Why don’t you tell us? Maybe he forgot something you can provide us with.” There’s barely-hidden sarcasm in Thursday’s voice; he clearly doesn’t like Hardy. Morse doesn’t either, but that doesn’t make him a murderer, just another one of countless Oxford academics who have managed to get on the police’s nerves in the course of the last few centuries._

_Hardy snorts. “It’s from one of the more... experimental pages of the grande Grimoire”. He gets his own copy, unsurprisingly cheaper and not as elaborate as Lestrange’s. “Quite frankly, no one has ever truly made sense of it, but...” he trails off._

_“But?”_

_“It seems like the writer was looking for – something, but sadly, we’re not exactly sure what that is.”_

_“You mean something like the philosopher’s stone?” Morse asks, and Hardy blinks._

_“Yes. Something similar. Most likely.”_

_“But how would that translate to the symbols being found at a murder scene?” Thursday demands._

_“Quite frankly, Inspector, that is your job.” He shoves the picture back into his arms with an impatient gesture. “Now, if you have no –“_

_“Excuse me, Mr. Hardy, but would you mind telling me your private musings on the subject?” Morse asks. Most academics won’t openly speak of their theories, but once prodded..._

_“What?”_

_“We learned that you have been studying le grande grimoire for a while. And we wondered if, perhaps, you would care to tell us what you think that page means...”_

_He immediately stands up straight, looking suddenly much taller. “If you ask me...” he begins, then pauses. Of course. Always give a good show, it might as well be the Oxford universities’ unofficial motto._

_Thursday throws Morse a glance, proving once again that he is utterly unimpressed by such antics. Sometimes, he wonders what it would have been like to stay at Lonsdale and being interviewed by his boss because of some small connection to a case. He doesn’t think it would have been pleasant, or that Thursday would have liked what he saw._

_“You see, the infinity symbol... it’s neverending. Everlasting. Those are not attributes commonly associate with, for example, the philosopher’s stone. But then, that wasn’t the only thing early alchemists were looking for, was it? Oh no. I think there is a chance that one of them was looking for immortality.”_

_“Immortality?” Morse asks._

_“Yes.”_

_“But what would the murders –“ Morse takes a deep breath. “Of course. Their life span for his.”_

_“His or hers” Hardy corrects him. “We do accept women too, you know.”_

_He reigns in his temper. “I am aware of that”._

_“Their lifespan for... his or hers?” Thursday asks, looking at each of them in turn._

_“Yes, Inspector. Eternal life by sacrificing those of others. Quid pro quo, if you will.”_

_“Quid pro quo” Thursday growls and Hardy raises his hands._

_“I am not saying I agree, or that it’s the only way to look at it. But it’s a possibility. And if someone were deranged enough to believe it possible –“_

_“Do you know anyone you would suspect of being so?” Morse asks._

_Hardy shrugs, and for the first time, Morse feels something like sympathy to him as he explains, “We’re at Oxford. Being strange is par for the course here, I am afraid.”_

_It’s true. While Morse would call most of those he met in his student days sane, he wouldn’t hesitate to call them weird too. Even the normal ones – Anthony Donne, for example – are a bit eccentric._

_“And if someone is desperate enough to believe –“_

_Hardy stops abruptly, and Morse recognizes that behaviour, too. He was never part of any cliques at Oxford, was too much of an outsider from the beginning, but loyalty to one’s friends is important here, has always been, will always be, no matter what those friends get up to. Mostly, he’s surprised that Hardy has any, as uncharitable as the thought is._

_He moves forward, making sure that Thursday sees his movement understanding that he shouldn’t chime in. “This is important, Mr. Hardy. I understand if you feel conflicted, but a young girl has been killed, and that’s not excusable, no matter what scientific breakthrough is at stake.”_

_He looks away._

_“She was sixteen” continues Morse, “She still went to school. According to her parents, she loved going out with her friends and –“_

_“YouShouldTalkToTom” Hardy all but splutters before regaining his composure. “Tom Tanner. Lives a few doors down. He studies the grimoire too.”_

_“And why should we talk to him?” Thursday asks._

_“His mother’s dying. He’s desperate.”_

_Morse shudders; he can’t help it. Even after all these years, he remembers his mother’s pale face, her clammy skin, her gentle touch as she told him he needed to be brave, and that she was sure his father and Gwen would give him a  good home. Even then, he had his doubts but didn’t utter them, not ready to take that away from her as she lay dying._

_He can tell Thursday knows what he’s thinking, of course. He usually can, when it comes to things like that. “We’re sorry to hear that” the DI chimes in, “Do you know how long she has been –“_

_“Last few months. Doctors say heart disease, but then, you know –“_

_The same thing that claimed his mother’s life. Morse swallowed. “And you say he’s desperate?”_

_“As anyone would be, trying to save their mother, I am sure you can imagine.”_

_“Yes I can.” His voice sounded thicker than he would like it to, and Hardy suddenly looked at him with too much understanding._

_“He’s not a bad man” he continues, “Tom, I mean. Like I said, who wouldn’t go crazy? She’s his mother.”_

_“Of course” Thursday continues smoothly, “Thank you, Mr. Hardy.”_

_“Was awfully quick to throw his friend under the bus, don’t you think?” he asks once the door has closed behind them. “For someone who claims it made him feel uncomfortable..:”_

_He doesn’t mention his mother, for which Morse is grateful. “Yes, but then, Professor Lestrange didn’t need long to tell us about Hardy, either.”_

_“That’s true” Thursday acquiesces. “What do you think about this immortality business?”_

_Morse blinks. “I think it would be very impractical, just take the example of the struldbruggs in Gulliver’s travels –“_

_“Know-it-all sod” Thursday mumbles, but he’s smiling. It’s good enough for Morse._

Morse pauses in typing down his reminisces. He’s been writing for about an hour, much more flawlessly than he’s used to, and he’s worried it’s another sign that Dev Thursday is ready to take over.

What makes it more complicated is that he knows it wouldn’t be a bad life. Far from it. The Thursdays’ elder son, another reason for them to feel proud, Joan’s and Sam’s doting big brother –

No. That way lies madness. He needs something, anything, to cling to what he is, what he has.

And then he knows.

He takes another piece of paper and writes _Joyce_ on it over and over.

Joyce. His real little sister. They don’t see each other as often as he would like, but he’ll change that once everything gets back to normal. As he grew up in his father’s home, she was the one good thing in his life. She was the one who cared for him in that house without love or pride.

He has to get back to Joycie.

Once he’s filled the page with her name, he leans his head back and closes his eyes. He won’t go to sleep; he just needs to rest for a minute.

Just a minute...


	8. Diverging Roads

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's my birthday, and I get to upload my favourite chapter so far :D

**After their talk in the garden, Morse feels raw and achy inside, and Mr. Thursday seems to notice because he courtly informs Mrs. Price that he’s taking him for a drive.**

**Morse hasn’t sat in a car since he got picked up at the train station by the man whose name he still doesn’t know, and this is a beautiful one. “Is it yours?”**

**Thursday chuckles. “I wish. Signed it out from the station.”**

**Morse frowns. “You won’t get into trouble for taking me, will you?”**

**He shakes his head. “Don’t worry about it, lad.”**

**He does, but he stays silent about it.**

**Mr. Thursday drives them to a nearby park and buys them each an ice, and the memories of Mum doing the same for him makes it hard to swallow.**

**Mr. Thursday realizes, of course. He must be a very good detective. “Your mum must have been a good person.”**

**“She was” he says. “Dad didn’t want to talk about her. Told me to shut up whenever I did. Sometimes Joyce asked me to tell her about Mum, though, and then we hid so I could.”**

**Mr. Thursday looks at him. “Talk all you want about her, lad. It’s natural.”**

**And so he does. But this time, it’s not about her death, about how pale and sickly she looked, about how he watched her slip away, but how Mum was when she was healthy and happy, how she loved to sing too, how she used to cook his favourite stew for his birthday.**

**“Like I said” Mr. Thursday says once he has stopped talking, sounding a bit strange, “A good Mum”.**

**Morse nods.**

**“For what it’s worth, I think she would be proud of you, for how you are handling all of this.”**

**Morse has heard that compliment before, from the doctors, from the other Quakers who came to see Mum as she lay dying, but it never meant something to him. “Handling it”. It was just another thing adults said that didn’t make sense. But from Mr. Thursday, it sounds genuine.  “Thank you, sir.”**

**“Still no reason for that. Never, alright?”**

**“Yes, Mr. Thursday.”**

**He shakes his head, a smile on his lips, and Morse wonders what’s so funny.**

* * *

 

**Soon after that day, Mr. and Mrs. Thursday drop by on Visiting Day to invite him to dinner. Morse accompanied his parents, and later Mum, and even later Dad an Gwen, when they were invited by others, but he himself has never been singled out this way, and he would wonder if it’s proper to accept, but he’s known the Thursdays for three months now. He’ll be turning thirteen in a few weeks.**

**Mrs. Price frowns when Mr. Thursday informs her of the next Saturday evening Morse is going to spend with them, but it doesn’t matter. She usually frowns when people talk to her, except for the fake smiles she gives when a child is adopted and she won’t have to care for them anymore.**

**Of course the other kids hear.**

**Tommy Brandon comes to stand beside Morse’s bed that night as he’s trying to read. “They’re just sorry for you, you know. People usually are for the older boys.”**

**He doesn’t mind if the Thursdays pity him. From others, it felt like an insult, but not from them. Never from them.**

**Morse knows the thought of adopting him has never crossed their minds. They have two children – Morse is a decade older than their youngest – so what could they possibly want with him? He’s got nothing to offer but another mouth to feed.**

**But it’s nice, spending time with them. And if Tommy thinks he can hurt him despite sounding obviously jealous, that’s his problem.**

**Morse even finds it in himself to pity him, just a little.**

* * *

**Dinner is ready by the time Mr Thursday and Morse arrive at the house. It looks nice. Cosy. Comfortable. The kind of house Morse would like to live in, eventually.**

**The family is waiting for them, Joan and Sam running out of what he soon learns is the dining room as soon as the door opens. “Morse!”**

**Sam grabs his leg while Joan hugs his hip.**

**Thursday laughs. “Do I get a greeting too, or should I leave again?”**

**They then proceed to hug their father while Morse politely greets Mrs. Thursday. “Good evening.”**

**“Hello, Morse. I hope you like stew?”**

**He remembers what he told Mr. Thursday and swallows. He nods, then asks, “May I help you set the table?”**

**“Oh no Morse, you’re a guest! Why don’t you keep an eye on those two trouble makers for a bit?”**

**Joan and Sam complain about being called trouble makers “In front of Morse” which is strangely touching.**

**They decide to do some colouring, like that first time their parents brought them to the orphanage.**

* * *

**After dinner, at the insistence of Joan, she, Morse and Sam are left in the living room to play. Sam has been going through a pirate phase for a while now (while, at two years old, not yet completely comprehending what exactly pirates did for a living, and they’re careful to edit that part out) and so they’re playing pirates.**

**Morse hasn’t had so much fun in a while. Eventually, he has to use the bathroom, and he makes Joan and Sam swear that they’ll behave for the few minutes in which he will be gone.**

**When he returns, he hears Mr. and Mrs. Thursday talking in the kitchen. He doesn’t mean to eavesdrop, but then his name falls, and he somewhat involuntarily stands still.**

**“It’s a crime, that’s what it is. Such a dear boy, and she basically kicked him out like a stray dog. It’s not his fault his mother died. Or that his father happened to be married before he met her.”**

**“I know, Win, trust me, I know”. Mr. Thursday sighed. “He sounds so resigned when he talks about it, too. Less like a kid and more like a grown-up trying to make the best out of the situation.”**

**“I am glad we met him that day. Did you see the look on Sam’s face just now, when we checked up on them? The kiddies adore him.”**

**Morse slinks away, burning with a strange mixture of shame at having listened in and pride that the Thursdays seem to think he’s good with the children.**

**Joan and Sam greet him with excited squeals.**

* * *

**Mr. Thursday brings him back to the orphanage a bit later than he said he would. Sam clings to Morse’s leg as he’s preparing to leave, uttering a string of question that he by now knows to interpret as requests that he stay, and he gives him a long hug before getting into the car.**

**“Thank you for the invitation” he says when they get back to the orphanage, as Mum taught him to. “It was a wonderful evening.”**

**“Aye, lad, that it was. We’ll have to repeat it someday soon.”**

**As he tries to return to the dormitory, he feels like singing for the first time in a long time.**

**It doesn’t last long.**

**Mrs. Price opens the door to her officer. “Endeavour, could I talk to you for a moment?”**

* * *

**“It’s just not right, you have to understand that, Endeavour.” The false smile of sympathy not felt, of unwarranted pity. “We can’t have you running around getting treats like invitations or play dates without being adopted, or the other children will think they have a right to those things as well. Tommy told me they cry themselves to sleep on a regular basis.”**

**He doesn’t feel bad for Tommy Brandon anymore.**

**“So you see, right? Why I will have to tell Mr. Thursday that it will be better if they don’t come by for a while?” Her tone makes it rather clear that with “for a while” she means “forever.”**

**Despite trying, as the Thursdays would say, to make the best of the situation, Morse doesn’t trust himself to speak, so he just nods and looks down at his hands. He won’t see them again. Once more, there are tears gathering in his eyes, of loneliness, of the unfairness of it all, of abandonment, even though he’s not being abandoned. The Thursdays owe him nothing. On the contrary, he’s the one who has to be thankful for them. They didn’t have to come visit him, but they did, and he’ll always be grateful for the time he got to spend with them.**

**But he won’t see them again.**

**He would have liked to know that this was the last evening. He would have liked to know so he could have paid better attention and could remember it better later.**

**“That’s all then, Endeavour. Good night.”**

**“Good night” he manages to say, knowing that no one will call him Morse again for a long time.**

**The other boys are already asleep. He’s glad for it.**

**He rolls into a ball under his thin duvet. A few tears leak out, no matter how often he tells himself that he’s being stupid, and he makes himself promise that they will be the last ones.**

* * *

**Mr. Thursday drops by on Monday during his lunch break with two sandwiches, one for him and one for Morse, as has become somewhat of a habit for him. Morse sees him enter the orphanage from the garden; he also sees Mrs. Price lie in waiting for him and buries his head in his book. He doesn’t want to watch him leave.**

**Instead, he soon hears him walk up to him. His heart sinks. Of course Mr. Thursday is too good a man to leave without a goodbye.**

**He’ll be fine, he tells himself. He just has to take care not to cry.**

* * *

 

**Mr. Thursday tells him that they are going for a drive and takes him to the park they once had ice cream together in, where Morse told him about Mum. They sit down on the same bench they sat then. It’s a nice day, and Morse looks at the little lake in front of them. There are two swans swimming on the lake.**

**Mr. Thursday clears his throat. “Look, Morse, Mrs. Price just told me – that is, I want to –“ He breaks off and scuffs. “I wish Win were here.”**

**Morse doesn’t. Hearing Mr. Thursday explain that they won’t come back would be bad enough, it would be much worse if Mrs. Thursday looked at him in that motherly way of hers as she did.**

**“What I want to say” Mr. Thursday continues, “Of course we’ve been talking about it. For a while now.”**

**That confuses Morse. Surely, if they felt they were giving him too much attention, they wouldn’t have invited him to dinner?**

**Mr. Thursday mumbles something to himself that sounds like “Can’t let things take their bloody time, can she”, then continues, talking in his usual tone, “You’re a great boy. The kiddies love you, and Win and I have grown very fond of you as well. If you’d come live with us, we’d be glad to have you. As our son, as Joan and Sam’s brother. If you want to be. You can also just stay Endeavour Morse and live with us. That’d be fine, too. We’ll have to get your father’s permission, I strongly suspect, but other than that...”**

**Morse doesn’t understand at first. What does he mean, come live with them?**

**Then, fearing it will sound stupid, he asks, “You want to adopt me?”**

**“Of course” he replies, as if that’s a normal thing to say.**

**And for the second time, Morse spontaneously bursts into tears while talking to Mr, Thursday, tears of relief, of joy even though he will later think he didn’t feel particularly happy yet, tears of wonder. This time, he doesn’t just pull him closer, he actually hugs him, and Morse buries his face in his shoulder, knowing but not caring that he’s probably ruining his coat, because they  like him enough to want to adopt him, they like him enough to** want **him, and he has trouble comprehending how or why.**

**Mr. Thursday rubs his back. “It’s alright, just let it out.”**

**Eventually, when his sobs quiet down, he hears a gently voice asking, “Excuse me, but is the boy alright?” and pulls away from Mr. Thursday to see the lady he bought the ice cream from the last time they were here.**

**He beams. “I’m getting adopted!”**

**She answers his bright smile with one of her own. “Now, if that’s not great news! Worth free ice cream, I’d say.”**

**And she gives them some, despite Mr. Thursday’s protests.**

* * *

**“I’ll talk to Mrs. Price. She was pretty shocked when I told her we hadn’t just made a hobby of seeing you and then vanishing off the face of the earth” Thursday scoffs. “We’ll have to be patient, see how quickly she can get a hold on your father. But perhaps in two or three weeks...”**

**“I’ll be thirteen in three weeks” Morse replies.**

**“We’ll have to make haste then.”**

**“That’s okay. I don’t mind.”**

**“No boy of mind is going to spend his birthday in an orphanage, Endeavour.”**

**Surprised, he realizes he doesn’t mind when Mr. Thursday calls him that.**

**At the door of Mrs. Price’s office, he pulls him into a hug. “Once you’ve declared you want to adopt a child, you no longer have to pay attention to the visit hours. I’ll bring the others over tomorrow.”**

**“I’ll be glad to see them, Mr. Thursday.”**

**He nods, apparently suddenly lost for words, then turns to the door. Before he opens it, however, he calls out to him once last time, and Morse, already on the way to the common room sees him smile. “I know it’s early days, Morse, and remember, if you don’t want to, you’ll never have to... but if you ever wish to call me Dad, I’ll be honoured.”**


	9. Confusion

He wakes up with a crick in his neck. Seems like he fell asleep at his desk, again. If Mother finds out, he’s never going to hear the end of it. He gets up and stretches his back, feeling remarkably rested despite it all; from the sunlight coming through the window, he can tell it’s early enough to get breakfast. Perhaps he’ll eat with Jerome, again; at least hearing about it will placate her, he thinks while smiling to himself.

The lecture today will be an easy one, too. Most people despise Mondays, but Dev has learned to cherish them; there is something about a new beginning, and may it be only that of a week, that he can never resist.

He quickly washes up and changes his clothes, then begins gathering the papers he’ll need for the day. He frowns when he realizes there’s a paper in his typewriter that he can’t remember putting there in the first place. He must have been more tired than he thought –

He reads the word that’s written down over and over again. _Joyce_.

And everything comes crashing down.

Morse’s legs feel weak, so he lets himself fall down on the chair behind him. He just spent 30 minutes in Dev Thursday’s shoes, and if not for the reminder he wrote himself...

He takes a few deep breaths. He’s still fighting, he’s still himself. He just has to keep remembering Joyce. She’s his anchor.

A knock on his door. He already knows it will be Jerome. “Come in” he calls out, gathering his papers.

“Good morning, I was wondering if I could persuade to have breakfast ag- Dev, are you alright? You look incredibly pale even for your standards.”

“I’m fine” he says, “Just fell asleep at my desk last night.”

Jerome clicks his tongue. “As long as I don’t have to tell your mother, it’s fine.”

“If we’re lucky, she’ll never find out” he replies, putting the papers he’ll need for the lecture in a briefcase he found in the room.

“I can only agree with you on that. Anyway, did you hear that the chair for...”

God bless Jerome and his instincts for when a deflection is due.

As they stroll towards the hall, Morse can’t help but reflect on how it felt to be Dev Thursday, just for a while. Mostly because it felt good. He’s ready to admit that. Sure of himself, if feeling a bit sheepish for having kipped at his desk. Confident in his life and his career, fond of his family and knowing they returned the sentiment.

“You’re getting lost in your head again” Jerome nudges him, “And you know I’m supposed to stop that when it occurs. Orders from your mother.”

“I know” he replies, doing his best to look like a normal Oxford professor from then on.

Breakfast is the same as it was the day he firs woke up in this world, although now that he’s growing a bit more familiar with it, it’s not difficult to tell that he is, indeed, rather popular; several members of Lonsdale pass by just to greet him, nodding at Jerome as an afterthought. Naturally, he realizes that some of that has to do with Jerome’s... reputation, but still.

“So... You have the Suetonius lecture today, don’t you?”

“Yes. Lies and Rumours and everything else that’s wrong with history.”

“At least it’s entertaining, Dev.”

He would be lying if he said he wasn’t worried about the lecture. He has no idea who his students are, for one, and his time reading Greats seems so long ago –

As it turns out, he shouldn’t have worried, which  naturally makes him worry all the more.

Not only is he able to recall the students’ names with ease – another proof that he’s slipping more and more into Dev Thursday’s shoes – but holding the lecture is... pleasing. Enjoyable. Exactly what he would imagine it would feel like, if he had this kind of life.

This cannot go on.

He decides to forego lunch and concentrate on typing down more of his memories, his real memories, but it is not meant to be.

He’s walking to his rooms when a voice calls out “Dev!” and he automatically turns around (again, he shouldn’t even react to the name. This is going to far.)

“Tony.”

Anthony Donn strides towards him, grinning. “Still the pride and joy of Lonsdale, I see. Thought I’d drop by for a chat.”

And Morse is caught making small talk with Tony trying desperately to hold onto his real life.

He’s listening to a story about one of Tony’s business associates when he starts grinning at him and Morse is about to ask what’s going on when hands cover his eyes. “Guess who.”

“Joan?”

He turns to find her smiling brightly. “Thought I’d make sure you eat lunch. God knows you can need it.”

Morse turns just in time to see Tony’s lecherous grin and is surprised by the protective feeling that wells in his breast. No one is supposed to look at my baby sister like that if she doesn’t want it. No. _No, that’s not right. Think of Joyce. Joyce. Your real sister._

“You just want to eat for free” he tells Joan.

She sticks out her tongue. “If you don’t realize someone wants to do right by you...”

They bid goodbye to Anthony. As they walk away, Joan shudders. “Why are you friends with him again? I could basically feel him undressing me with his eyes-“

“He can be amusing for the odd half hour.”

“Yes, well, don’t you take any advice from him how to talk to girls. I want a nice sister-in-law who adores you and makes sure Sam and I have cute nieces and nephews.”

“Why do I have to be the one to ensure the family legacy goes on?”

“Easy enough, you’re the oldest. I know it wasn’t easy for you after...” She doesn’t finish the sentence and Morse realizes, with a curious sense of detachment, that he must have met Susan in this life after all. “Anyway, that’s all over and done with” she continues brightly, “And I’m starving.”

During lunch – spent mostly listening to Joan’s stories about her job at the bank – Morse tries to hold onto his memories of Joyce; so much so that one time he can’t help but answer, “They know what they have, Joycie.”

Joan stares at him. “Joanie. Sorry.”

She shakes her head. “You really should take a holiday soon.”

Morse can’t explain why, but he feels like he’s being watched, all of a sudden.

Once he’s bid Joan goodbye, he returns to his rooms and his typewriter.

_Loud music emanates from the room._

_“Rachmaninoff” Morse says automatically. “Island of the dead.”_

_“A bit morbid, considering” Thursday muses as he knocks loudly. They have to wait for about a minute before the music stops and the door flies open._

_“What do you want?” Tanner snaps._

_“Mr.Tanner? Oxford City Police. DI Thursday, DC Morse. May we speak to you for a moment?”_

_“Can’t see why, but come in.”_

_Despite his impolite manners, his room is much cleaner than Hardy’s, much cleaner, Morse things ruefully, than his flat has been since he moved in. “What do you want from me?”_

_“Mr.Tanner, you might be aware that a young girl was found murdered a few days ago...”_

_He winces. “Yes, I did hear about that. Could hardly be avoided, in a city like Oxford.”_

_“Some information has come our way that you might –“_

_“Oh, was it Hardy? Guy’s had it out for me since I did better at –“_

_“Mr. –“_

_“Look, I would love to keep this fascinating talk going, but my mother is dying, and I have to go see her in the hospital” he sweeps past them. “If you want to talk to me, perhaps pick a better time.”_

* * *

 

_“What do you think of him?” Thursday asks as they walk back to the car. “Could just be stress.”_

_“True, it can’t be easy on him” Morse replies, glancing to his right, where Professor Lestrange is talking to what he supposes is another one of his students and a girl that looks a bit too young for Lonsdale. Maybe she’s a relative. Students like to show them around, sometimes. Morse would have to, if Joyce had been allowed to visit him._

_“Still, a young girl’s dead, and I have a bad feeling about all of this.”_

Morse stops typing and looks up, feeling confused. There was something... about the girls... there were three victims, surely? Not more? He only remembered three...

Then again, every single one of his memories could be unreliable. He could slip into being Professor Dev Thursday within seconds and never know it.

He takes a deep breath, takes another piece of paper and carefully types the names of the three victims he remembers

Mary Taylor.

Kathy Baleen.

Ellen Smith.

_Two days later, it turns out that Thursday and Morse’s instincts were right._

_Another girl goes missing._

_Kathy Baleen, fifteen, precocious, friendly, loves to laugh. Her parents are frantic, which is all too understandable; and Morse can’t help but think that they response to their missing person’s report is somewhat more thorough than in Mary Taylor’s case, when they didn’t know about the killer yet._

_They don’t find her, of course. Not on the first day, and not on the second._

_At the end of the second, he and Thursday go to a pub after their shift ends._

_“He’s got her alright. He’s got her, and we’ll find her body soon, I’d say.”_

_Morse looks into his beer and says nothing._

_“Anything from Lonsdale?”_

_As soon as the girl went missing, Thursday sent Morse to Lonsdale to ask the porter if anyone had behaved strangely in the last few days; he denied it, of course – God forbid that something could tarnish the reputation of the university. Especially to a police man._

_Still, they do what they always did in such cases – additional forces are brought in, they interview Kathy’s parents and friends, they try their best._

_And it’s not good enough._

_She is found on the fourth day after she went missing, meaning that he kept her for a shorter period of time._

_She lies in a field not far from the outskirts of the city._

A knock on his door interrupts his work, and he probably shouldn’t be surprised to see a student there, a shy, stammering mess, not unlike what he believes himself was like in those early days, thoroughly confused by Plato; he lets him in and quickly gathers that he must have a reputation for helping out, since it’s only the first in a string of visitor’s that day.

What confuses him the most is the trust they show him. He remembers respecting his professors, but truly, completely, trusting them little to not all; he must be regarded somewhat differently at Lonsdale.

The moment the last student has left Jerome shows up to drag him to dinner; by the time he returns to his rooms, he’s thoroughly exhausted and feeling more confused than ever.

Mrs. Thursday calling him because she “wanted to her your voice, dear” doesn’t help matters.

“You sound tired.”

“Quite a few of my students dropped by today”.

“Oh dear, you better have a cuppa and an early night.”

“Yes, mother.”

“Don’t think I don’t recognize that tone. That’s the one I used to hear when I was trying to send you to bed and you wanted to stay up reading. At least don’t work too hard, alright?”

Love so easily given, care so easily bestowed on someone. He hangs up gently after he says goodbye.

Realizing that he can’t stave off going to sleep forever, and that it’s possibly more dangerous to get overpowered by it and then wake up confused instead of being prepared, he types out a few small cards for his bedside table. One simply says _Joyce_ ; another _DC E. Morse_ ; and so on.

When he can’t put it off any longer, he goes to bed, feeling more apprehensive than he can ever recall feeling, and that includes the time he almost got devoured by a tiger. 


	10. New Home

**He’ll never know all of the details, but years later Father will tell him that the simple _Do what you want message_ he got from Dad made his blood boil. By that time, he will care so little about it, having spent years under the Thursday’s roof, that he’ll just shrug and answer that he’s happy it went that well. **

**But now, when Mr. Thursday has just told him that they have been thinking of adopting him for a while, that they actually wondered if they should from that first visit they brought Joan and Sam to see him, he still can’t quite believe it.**

**Older children don’t get adopted. That’s just the way it is. A law of nature. No one wants older children, especially not boys.**

**Tommy Brandon is very subdued since he heard the news – Mrs. Price made the announcement at breakfast, as she is wont to do –  and it takes Morse a while to figure out that he’s jealous, jealous because Morse will have a home while he’s been here much longer and won’t. He’d like to comfort him but doesn’t know how.**

**The day after their talk in the park, shortly after Morse has returned from school, Mr. Thursday makes good of his promise and brings his family with him.**

**The children are ecstatic, bursting into the room before their parents.**

**“Morse!” Joan runs up to him. “Dad says you’ll come home with us!”**

**“Not just now, but soon” he replies, still having trouble wrapping his head around it himself.**

**Sam has once again grabbed his leg and is telling him all about how they will be more boys than girls at home now, which seems to be important to him for some reason. Morse hesitates, then ruffles his hair.**

**“I always wanted a big brother” he squeals, and something difficult to describe swells in his chest.**

**Mr. and Mrs. Thursday walk up to them. “Oh Morse” she says, drawing him into a hug, mindful of Sam who still won’t let ho of him, “I’m so glad you want to come live with us.”**

**“I can’t tell you how thankful –“ he begins, but she shushes him.**

**“Oh, dear, never thank us for this. We’re the ones who should be grateful.”**

**He doesn’t quite understand her logic, but she seems adamant, so he acquiesces.**

**He can feel the looks of the other children in the orphanage, looks of envy, looks of awe, and also a few of actual well-meant joy on his behalf, and he leans down to gently detach Sam from his leg in order to play with him and Joan to hide that a few tears are welling up in his eyes again.**

* * *

**As he promised, Mr. Thursday seems to do everything he can to make sure Morse is out of the orphanage by his birthday. After the aforementioned acquiescence by his father, it turns out that he can go home – home, he actually has a home again – exactly a week before that.**

**He realizes the other children like him better than he thought they did; on the Saturday morning the Thursdays are picking him up, many wish him well, and Tommy Brandon comes to apologize. “Sorry I told you no one would ever adopt you. Guess one should never give up hope, hm?”**

**“I really hope you find a good home” Morse says, sincerely.**

**“Thanks, Morse. Thursday now, I guess.”**

**He didn’t think about it before, and Mr. Thursday has certainly not said anything about having to change his name. He doesn’t know if he would like to, yet.**

**Maybe he’ll ask if they want him to. They are kind enough to have taken him into their home and their hearts, he hopes; and he’d be glad to do something that would make them happy.**

**His old name never brought him much joy, anyway.**

**Mrs. Price’s goodbye feels much less heartfelt, simply consisting of telling him to be a good boy. He can clearly hear the threat in her voice – that the Thursdays might send him back if he isn’t – and resists the urge to roll his eyes. He might not have known them long, but he knows them well enough to fell sure that would never happen, no matter how angry they might get at what Mrs. Price claims are his “mannerisms.”**

**He sits in the common room, looking around one last time, wondering why he feels strangely apprehensive about leaving it all behind. He decides it must be because he did spend three quarters of a year here after all, because he got used to it, because he will have to change schools again (as Mr. Thursday informed him regretfully). Not because he doesn’t want to leave.**

**His things have been packed since last night.**

**As the minutes pass, he gets lost in his head, as he sometimes does when he’s nervous. What if they don’t come to pick him up after all? What if there has been an accident, and not only is he never going to see them again, but Joan and Sam lost their parents because of him, and –**

**The door opens and Mr. and Mrs. Thursday come in. He resists the urge to run towards them like a little boy.**

**“There you are, Morse. All set to go?”**

**He nods.**

**“Anyone you want to say goodbye to?”**

**“I already did, Mr. Thursday.”**

**Mrs. Thursday hugs him. “Let’s go home, then.” She’s put on a nice dress and make-up and it takes him a few moments to understand she did it for him.**

**Mr. Thursday signed out a car from work again and Morse gets into the backseat, throwing one last glance at the orphanage. As apprehensive as he feels, he knows he won’t miss it.**

**“We have a neighbour watching the kiddies. They’ve been excited the whole morning” Mr. Thursday tells him.**

**“We put you and Sam in a room together” Mrs Thursday says, “I hope you don’t mind.”**

**“I have spent my nights in a room with twenty other boys” he points out, “And they were older than Sam.”**

**Mr. Thursday chuckles. “That’s true. And he’s ecstatic that he gets to sleep in a big boy bed, now. Don’t be surprised when he crawls into yours during a thunder storm, though. He’s afraid of them.”**

**Morse files the information away for later.**

**“We thought we’d inscribe you at school on Monday” Mrs. Thursday continues brightly, “It’s not far from home. One of the reasons we chose the house, to be honest. You can walk there. You’d start as soon as possible, although it doesn’t matter much, I’d say – Mrs. Price showed us your marks.”**

**He looks down on his folded hands. “I try my best.”**

**“It shows.”**

**He doesn’t know how to deal with praise. He hasn’t heard any since his Mum died. No, that’s not true – the Thursdays have always been kind to him, right from the beginning.**

**“Anyway, I hope you’ll like the garden –“**

**And they make small talk until they arrive at the house. His new home.**

**Ever since Mum died, Morse hasn’t thought of anywhere as home. He supposes he’ll have to change that, but he suspects it won’t be difficult.**

**He tries to get his suitcase, but Mr. Thursday beats him to it. “Hm. Feels a bit light.”**

**“It’s all I had with me when I left... when I left Joyce” he says weakly, unsure whether they will be disappointed that to have to get him more clothes, or how they would feel if he told them he only had one suitcase when he left “home.”**

**“Oh don’t worry about that, dear” Mrs. Thursday says, brushing a lock off his forehead. “We’ll get you more clothes soon enough.”**

**So that doesn’t seem to be the problem, although Morse can’t really think about it now because it’s the first time she has touched him like that.**

**The door busts open and the children bustle out; Morse is quick to run at the other side of the car, lest they be tempted to walk out into the road. “Hello” he greets them.**

**“Morse!”**

**And then they both go for a hug at the same time, so he decides it’s better to simply sink onto his knees.**

**When he looks up, he sees the Thursdays and an elderly woman smile at them. “Oh my, I see it now. You must be Morse. I’m Mrs. Leeds from next door.”**

**He nods at her because the children are apparently not yet ready to let go.**

* * *

 

**Once they allow him to get up, they drag him upstairs. Sam can’t wait to show him their room, and Joan tags along, looking extra important to make up for the fact that Morse won’t be sleeping in hers.**

**The Thursdays slowly follow; every time Morse glances at them, he sees indulgent smiles, so he figures everything’s alright.**

**The room is small but comfortable, and he realizes with surprise that they actually put up a shelf for his books.**

**Yes. He’ll like it here.**

* * *

**Mr. Thursday has to leave them soon afterwards; apparently too many cars are currently signed out at the station and he has to bring back the one they picked Morse up in but he promises to return soon.**

**Mrs. Thursday is cooking lunch – stew, of course – while Morse, Joan and Sam are playing. He throws longing glances at the radio but doesn’t dare ask, until Joan, as usual aware of what’s going on, breaks free of them and runs into the kitchen to do just that. The second Mrs. Thursday hears that Morse would like to turn on the radio, she comes out and won’t listen to his apologies.**

**“This is your home now, Morse. Of course you can turn on the radio.”**

**He nods and watches carefully as she explains to him how it works.**

* * *

**“What’s that?” Sam asks as soon as he has found a station he likes.**

**Joan draws herself up to her full height and explains with all the wisdom of a five-year-old, “It’s o-pera.”**

**“Opera, that’s right” he explains. “It’s a special kind of music.”**

**Sam stares at the radio and frowns. “You like it?”**

**“Yes, but we can –“**

**“That’s good then” he says happily, and Morse swallows.**

**He’s starting to think he’ll have to get used to not having to apologize for everything he does. It’s a nice thought.**

* * *

**He’ll never know that Fred, upon returning home half an hour later, stands still for a minute, puzzled by the music drifting through the air.**

**Win hurries to greet him and puts her finger up to her lips. “Morse wanted to listen to it.”**

**“And the kiddies are alright with it?”**

**“I think they believe anything that Morse likes is automatically a good idea.”**

**“That’s going to be fun during puberty” he comments lightly.**

**“Oh, hush. I would like to have a word with that father and stepmother of his – he seems so apologetic, no matter what he does, poor boy.”**

**“Give him time. He’ll be slamming the doors and complaining about what’s for dinner soon enough.”**

**“I don’t think we’ll ever have to deal with that, Fred. He’s already been so helpful; I can’t recall when making lunch was that easy. The children keep him occupied, I dare say.”**

**“It’s not every day you get a new brother, and a big one at that.”**

* * *

**Morse doesn’t realize immediately that Mr. Thursday has returned. Sam’s preoccupation with pirates has made place for one both eh and Joan share – dinosaurs – and he’s busy remembering anything he knows about them in order to facilitate their playing.**

**“What about that one?” And Sam does an impression that it takes Morse a moment to understand.**

**“Oh, that’s a Tyrannosaurus Rex. He was very strong, and very dangerous.”**

**Sam huffs with pride.**

**“But Sam’s the smallest” Joan says, “He can’t be a Tyrannosaurus.”**

**Morse thinks. “But they would have to be small before they grow up.”**

**She ponders that for a moment, then reluctantly agrees with, I guess.”**

**“Are you having fun?”**

**Morse sees Mr. Thursday and tries to get up from the floor to greet him properly, only that Sam’s busy climbing over him to get to his father, and he steps up to them to pick him up and ruffle Morse’s hair. “Good to see you fitting in so well.”**

**Morse doesn’t know if he does, but it’s nice to hear.**


	11. Outsider

This morning, Morse is prepared, and the first thing his eyes land on as he opens them is the paper with Joyce’s name on it. He takes a deep breath and shakes off every thought that belongs to Dev Thursday and not to him.

He needs more information on the case. His schedule proves to be light on Thursdays, with only one lecture in the morning, meaning he can have lunch with DI Thursday under the pretext of getting him out of the station – with the added bonus that he can go to see him there and see if he can get any information out of the colleagues he should be working with instead of Jerome and the others.

The lecture is easy enough, but he can’t say if it’s because he hasn’t forgotten much from his studies or because he is slowly slipping into the role whoever did this to him wants him to be.

He leaves quickly afterwards but is stopped by a young girl. “Excuse me, Professor Thursday?” She’s biting her lip and looking uncomfortable.

“Yes?”

“I... I know how this sounds, but I have a question.”

“Of course.” He can’t just leave here there. There is a duty of care the fellows of the college owe their students, and for all intents and purposes, Morse is one of them now.

“It’s – I noticed that – my biological parents are still my emergency contact” she forces out, “And I would really like my adoptive parents to be, and I don’t know if it’s going to be a hassle, and I heard through the grapevine that you were adopted and –“

“Yes, I am adopted” he replies simply. “I was when I was twelve.”

“Thirteen for me.” She looks away. “They told me no one would want an older girl...”

“I know that line from somewhere” he says smoothly, letting the instincts Dev Thursday must have developed for talks like this come to the surface for the moment. “Don’t worry, it’s easy enough. Just talk to the college, they’ll change it without a fuzz.”

She looks incredibly relieved. “Thank you, Professor.”

Then she runs off without another word, but who can blame her. It seems like it cost her a bit just to ask the question.

He continues on his way. “Pinter” he calls into the lodge.

“Yes, Mr. Thursday?”

“I’m going to have lunch with my father.”

It’s becoming easier and easier to refer to Inspector Thursday as such. He has to be careful.

“Of course. The usual pub?”

He doesn’t recall any porter he met in his life having a similarly friendly relationship with the members, but then, he wasn’t privy to all the intimate details of life at Lonsdale, not even when he was a student there himself.

“Yes, thank you.”

Pinter gives him a bright smile and Morse wonders if this is how it feels to be popular.

It’s strange to stand in front of the station, knowing that he won’t be entering it as a police man but as a civilian. Even though he’s had his doubts, still has his doubts, this used to be a place he belonged to and now only has the most strenuous of connections with.

Still, as he makes his way to Thursday’s office, many people recognize and greet him enthusiastically. Shirley Trewlove steps up to him, as friendly and efficient as ever. “Hello, Dev.”

“Shirley”. Based on the greetings, he’s on a first-name basis with most of the other officers.

“Are you here to take him to lunch?”

He nods.

“Good” she lowers her voice. “I don’t want to – but he could really use a break.”

“Don’t worry, I’ve got it covered.”

She smiles.

“Hey Dev.”

It’s the most friendly greeting Peter Jakes has ever bestowed on him, but he’s always managed to be charming when he wants to be, and he probably figures that he should be nice to his boss’ eldest.

“Hello Peter” he says calmly, another memory rising to the surface.

**“Mr. Thursday” Pinter’s voice sounds pinched and worried and he instantly rises from his desk. “What is it, Mrs. Pinter?” He glances at his clock. It’s not that late. What could possibly –**

**“I am terribly sorry sir, but there’s a drunk gentleman who insists on seeing you. Says it’s private and of the outmost importance.”**

**“Is he at the lodge?”**

**“Yes.”**

**“I’m coming.”**

**Dev doesn’t know what he expected, but it certainly wasn’t peter Jakes, his father’s bagman of about two years, all but holding himself up on a chair.**

**“I tried to get him to sit, but he’s too agitated for that” Pinter apologizes.**

**Dev shakes his head. “It’s quite alright. I am sorry to ask this of you, but could you leave us alone for a moment? I’ll try to find out what’s going on.”**

**“Of course, Mr. Thursday.”**

**Somehow, with a lot of patience, he manages to understand what Peter is saying.**

**Oh God. That’s why Father was so stressed and tense over the last few weeks.**

**And now he will...**

**Dev closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. “I’ll deal with it, Peter, do you hear?” He ushers him into a chair. “Mr. Pinter!”**

**He immediately bursts into the room – he must have been standing right in front of the door. “Mr. Pinter. I am sorry to ask so much of you, but I need another favour. A big one.”**

**“Mr. Thursday?”**

**“My father...” he swallows. “He is in danger. I need you to call the police, anyone you can think of, to make sure as many officers as possible are sent to Blenheim Vale. Otherwise we might lose him.”**

**His heart is beating fast. Peter seems to be on the verge of falling asleep, now that he has delivered his message. “I’ll bring Peter to my lodgings and then I’ll try to find him.”**

**“Of course Mr. Thursday. Just leave it to me. In case they don’t listen to me, I’ll try to get someone higher up to speak to them.**

**“Thank you, Pinter.”**

**“It’s the least I can do.”**

**Sometimes Dev thinks Pinter is too grateful for him having tutored his niece two semesters ago.**

**And then he’s running. He knows his father, knows he’ll do anything to set this right, even if it means –**

**He’ll never know how he makes it. He somehow manages to catch a cab then he runs some more, and then he reaches Father just as he is about to enter Blenheim Vale.**

**“Father!”**

**He turns around. There’s an expression on his face Dev saw only once before – when he went after those who had decided to come to Oxford after they hurt Mickey Carter in London; and he knows that he was right. If he’d gone in, they wouldn’t have seen him alive again.**

**“Dev, what are you doing here?”**

**He’s panting. Life at Lonsdale means he doesn’t get much chance to exercise, and he vows to change that in the future. “Peter Jakes. He came to me. Told me what you were planning. I – couldn’t – allow – you – to –“**

**“Jakes should mind his own business.”**

**“He does” Dev says, recalling his drunken ramblings with a shudder. “He was one of the children, Father. One of the children who had to live here.”**

**“Dear God.” Father’s fingers tighten around the grip of his gun. “All the more reason, Dev. You have to understand –“**

**“I have to understand nothing. You seem to think that this sacrifice is worth it, but ask anyone of us, ask Mother. It’s not.”**

**“Dev –“**

**“Help is on its way. Pinter is doing everything he can to stir them into action. You know what happens in this city when a college gets involved.”**

**“But –“**

**“Please, Father. Don’t.” He feels like a child again, like that day at the lake when he thought Father was going to tell him goodbye, and like then, he is the only one who can make it better.**

**He looks at him, then sighs. The gun drops to the floor.**

**Dev can breathe again.**

* * *

**The police show up soon afterwards. It seems that Pinter actually did manage to get to one of the older dons, and that he was far from pleased, but that a call for help from a DS was still enough to get him to work on it.**

**Dev has no idea why Pinter decided to keep his connection to everything a secret.**

**Once the bad apples, as Father calls them, have been arrested, both he and Dev take a few days off.**

**On one of their free days, Peter Jakes shows up, and of course Mother immediately starts fussing over him, despite his obvious desire to draw Dev into a corner for just a minute.**

**He eventually gets him alone.**

**“I have to apologize. I didn’t realize how much –“**

**“Don’t, Peter. You – you saved my father’s life by coming to see me. I won’t forget it, by God I won’t.”**

**He nods.**

**Dev lowers his voice and continues, “And concerning... certain other things. Don’t worry. No word shall ever pass my lips.”**

**All in all, he thinks Peter is too thankful for that simple concession.**

Morse blinks. So that’s why DI Thursday isn’t suffering from the cough that seems to plague him more and more in the real world here. He should have noticed much sooner that something was missing.

As usual, his flash has only lasted a few seconds at the most.

“And? Are the students annoying you again?”

“On the contrary, most of them are remarkably well-behaved these days.”

“You’re lucky with your clientele.”

“You can say that again” he answers as Jakes sits down.

“Of course you know all about it.”

“We don’t talk about such things at home” he reminds him.

“HA bloody hah.” So everyone seems to know Thursday breaks his own rules in this world when it comes to his el-

When it comes to Morse.

“No idea where to look for her” he says, holding a picture of a girl that seems oddly familiar, but Morse can’t place her. At least he knows how she looks like, now. “Sounds exactly the same, too. Full of life and happy as could be until someone snatched her.”

“What are you getting up to now, lads?”

He looks up. “Hello, Father. I thought we could do lunch. I am sure Mother will forgive me for stopping you from eating your sandwich”.

“Nothing she doesn’t forgive you” he grumbles, but there’s a smile on his lips, and from Jakes’s relieved expression, Morse can tell that it was the first today.

“How are you?” he asks as they are strolling to the pub.

“Fine.” After a moment, Thursday sighs, “There’s no point in lying to you, is there.”

“I think we both know there isn’t.”

“Pamela Waters, the last one to go missing – we still haven’t found a single trace of her. It’s only a matter of time.”

Pamela Waters. No, he doesn’t remember the name. But that doesn’t have to mean anything in this strange universe where he can’t even keep his false memories from bleeding into his real ones.

He’ll have to continue writing down what happened as soon as he gets back to college.

At least he has a name, now. It has been kept out of the papers deliberately.

“You don’t all have to watch me like a hawk, by the way.”

“I have my experiences” he remembers smoothly, shuddering at the very thought of trying to get Thursday to stay out of Blenheim Vale that day.

“Suppose you’re right about that” he acquiesces. Another change in Thursday he was too busy to notice. The Inspector he left behind is rather prone to angry outbursts these days, another consequence of his injury Dev saved him from.

“Plus, now you can tell Mother I ate lunch.”

“Ah, so that’s it. You just want to be spared another lecture on how to take care of yourself”.

“Something like it.”

He is not going to get any more information this way, so he might as well have something to eat.


	12. Deeper

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I bet I can know what you were thinking! You were thinking because this is later than usual that there would be no chapter today! Hah! As if I could leave Morse angsting all alone. Enjoy!

After he returns to college, with nothing to show for his endeavours but a hug from DI Thursday – and he’s starting to think he’s growing too accustomed to the Thursdays’ affection – he immediately goes back to his typewriter. He needs to write down everything he remembers, to stay sane.

_Morse is comparing the files on the two victims for what feels like the hundredth time. For what it’s worth, there seem to be some similarities. Both of them are described as vivacious and fun-loving, friendly, enjoying going out and meeting friends; it’s not much, but at least it’s better than nothing._

_The whole station is expecting another girl to go missing any day. Everyone can tell._

_“And? Do you have something for us, boy wonder?” Jakes demands. Morse has once again been freed from regular duties to focus on the case, and he can’t help but suspect that for the first time, he would rather enjoy counting paperclips instead of working on this._

_“Whoever he is, he has a type.”_

_“What do you mean? Mary Taylor was blonde, Kathy Baleen brunette –“_

_“Personality type” Morse corrects himself. “Both outgoing, friendly.”_

_“No wonder you would notice that.”_

_Jakes is just as much on edge as every other officer in the building, so Morse doesn’t reply._

_“Shouldn’t this be right up your alley? Another sick one?”_

_“Which is why I am trying to do my job.”_

_“Sergeant” Thursday snaps from inside his office and Jakes throws Morse an angry look as he obeys the summon._

_WPC Trewlove brings him a cup of tea. “We’re all a bit nervous around here.”_

_“Yes, matey, I wouldn’t listen to what he says either” Strange chimes in._

_Morse shrugs. “He’s right: We should have found something. Anything.”_

_“But you running yourself ragged won’t help us, either.”_

_“And what if the next girl goes missing?”_

_“Why do you say when?”_

_Morse doesn’t answer, but his reply would have been because it is only a matter of time. He can tell Thursday is waiting too, waiting for another pair of parents to come screaming for help, scared out if their wits._

_It happens three days later._

_Ellen Smith. Strawberry blonde, friendly, outgoing, and only just turned sixteen._

_This time, not a single officer can bear to be left at the station, and it becomes all but deserted in the race to find her._

_Morse already knows, feels it in his bones that they’ll be too late again._

A knock on his door. Morse constantly keeps forgetting that he has duties here too, duties that prevent him from doing what he ought to be doing.

The fact that he immediately recognizes the man standing in front of him as “old Pinnock” as Jerome would describe him, fills him with dread. “Professor Pinnock –“

“Professor Morse “he says, sweeping in. “I do hope I am not wasting your valuable time –“

“No, of course not”.

Morse blinks.

**“That’s Pinnock, alright” Jerome says conversationally. Morse has known him for a week now, and he’s starting to think Jerome in turn knows everyone at Lonsdale.**

**“Sorry?”**

**“Professor Pinnock. Right there! One of the old grey eminences of the place. Apparently once he decides you’re worth his notices you’ve got it made.”**

**“Doesn’t he teach Arameic?”**

**“Oh, Dev” Jerome sighs, “How are you ever going to cope when we’re both lecturers here and he decides to grace you with his presence.”**

Morse clears his throat. “How may I help you?”

As it turns out, Pinnock is here to draw him into an hour-long discussion about a contested point of grammar in Ancient Greek, and Morse does his best to keep up.

As a matter of fact, he does a little too well. He has no problem remembering the vocabulary, or to understand what Pinnock wants.

He has to get home, and that soon.

He only has no idea how.

When Pinnock finally leaves – no doubt Jerome will see and soon tell everyone at Lonsdale – he returns to his typewriter, staring at the names of Jakes, Trewlove and Strange for a moment, trying to remember why they are important before shaking his head and returning to himself.

He stares at the other piece of paper, the one with his sister’s name on it. He has to remind himself of who he is, what he is.

_With another girl missing, they return to Lonsdale._

_Lestrange immediately informs them that he thinks Hardy has been acting weird. He gives Morse a shrewd glance as he adds, “Then again, perhaps it’s only old age finally catching up with me.Who am I after all to decide which student is acting weird, I, who will soon reach the end of my life?_ Here at the quiet limit of the world, a white-hair’d shadow roaming like a dream _...”_

_They have nothing, of course. They can’t even bring in either Tanner or Hardy._

_Ellen Smith is found at yet another place on the outskirts of town, no one saw or heard anything.._

_Even DeBryn seems to slowly crack under the strain and the heat, if the way he snaps at jakes for standing in his way when he arrives at the scene is anything to go by. “Sergeant, if you would kindly allow me to do my job, I would be most thankful.”_

_Jakes step away without a complaint. They all feel defeated._

_When Morse and Thursday arrive at the station after telling her parents, feeling as tired and defeated as they ever will, they –_

Morse experiences a moment of panic when he realizes that he doesn’t remember anything that happened after. Three victims, and then his memories just... stop.

No. That’s not true. He remembers, knows there was an arrest. But he can’t recall the suspect’s name, face or even the circumstances of his arrest.

Neither can he say whether or not there were more victims. He’s starting to think that he did know when he woke up, or rather he believed he knew than, but that the curious amnesia that seems to slowly slip over his old, real life, erasing it and replacing it with the one he woke up in, has already done its work in that regard.

He has to do something.

It seems like Morse has only one option left.

He has to work the case. All alone.

* * *

After carefully prodding his memories (and making sure enough papers with Joyce’s name on them are lying around, just in case) he comes to the conclusion that in this world, it won’t seem out of character for him to join some of the younger officers for a pint at the pub.

**Seeing as he will be responsible for watching Father’s back from now on, Dev has made it his mission to learn as much about Peter Jakes as he can. Or maybe it would be more accurate to say that Joan and Sam insisted he do so. After all, he’s the closest in age to him, and there’s nothing against having a drink together since Father introduced them this morning.**

**Granted, he laughed and winked at him when he explained to his family where he was going, but that was to be expected. “Just be careful with the drinks, Dev.”**

**“It was. One. Time.”**

**He’s never going to forget it, though, Dev thinks ruefully. Oh well, at least he got drunk for the first and only time in his life at home, where no one but his family could see it.**

**In the pub, he not only spots Peter Jakes, but also Sergeant Strange, who’s been around for a while now.**

Yes, it won’t seem out of character here at all. And he needs information above everything else.

They wave him over as soon as they see him. “Dev. It’s been a while since you came here, matey.”

It’s strangely comforting to know that no matter which universe, Strange will always call him that. “I had a lot to do.”

“Heard about that. Your father took me on a stakeout a few weeks back, and I learned more about this chap Thucydides than I ever wanted to – no offense.”

“None taken.”

Morse buys the first round, since in this world not only does he draw the comfortable salary of a university lecturer, but he also never had to pay Dad’s bills.

He wonders if he’s perhaps still alive in this world and is shocked at how little he cares.

“How are you doing?” he asks once their drinks have arrived.

Jakes is smoking, of course. “Not well, really. We were all damn glad you showed dup to have lunch with the Old Man. He’d been all but tearing our heads off.”

“It’s normal that you’re all nervous, I dare say. The students at Lonsdale talk about it, too.” It’s not a lie; Morse has heard the whispers, and several of the female students have started going around in groups. Despite the killer being interested in girls who are a few years younger, he cannot say he blames them.

“Small wonder in a city like Oxford” Strange says. “We’ve been through it all, too – searching for her. Not a trace of her to be found anywhere.”

So they have done everything they could, then, like they did when the other victims vanished. It’s not much, but at least it’s information.

Morse has two more pints while Strange and Jakes occasionally let drop a few hints on what the police are planning on doing. He’s more than a little tipsy as he returns to Lonsdale, proving once again that he’s not used to drinking, but t least he can walk in a straight line.

The problem with having drunk more than he is used to, which he completely forgot while he was focused on getting small bits of information out of Jakes and Strange, was that he passes out soon after he returns to his rooms.

**Morse thinks he’ll like the school better than his last one; it has a library and isn’t far from his new home. Plus Mrs. Thursday made a point of telling the principal that he likes to be called Morse instead of Endeavour when she really didn’t have to.**

**Mrs. Leeds is looking after Joan and Sam again. They complained on being left behind, but Mrs. Thursday was firm, telling them that they’d be back sooner if they let them go quickly.**

**Morse had to promise to colour with them again later.**

**It was only after they left that he realized it was his first time being alone with Mrs. Thursday.**

**His new mother.**

**He still thinks of Mum a lot, and he knows she’d never try to replace her. She’s too nice for that.**

**And yet...**

**“We’ll see if we can get you some clothes on our way back. You definitely need more than one pair of trousers.”**

**Morse shrugs. “Gwen always said the fewer clothes the fewer things she had to wash.”**

**Mrs. Thursday makes the face he has come to associate with her judging Gwen’s homemaking skills and finding them lacking. He’s not surprised. Mrs. Thursday keeps a very clean and orderly house. “Yes, well, a growing boy needs a decent amount of things to wear.”**

**As they are walking to the store she asks, “So you like opera, Morse?”**

**“Yes. I did try and listen to some modern music, but it didn’t feel right.”**

**“I am somewhat fond of jazz, myself, but we can’t all have the same tastes. At least Joan and Sam will learn a thing or two about classical music.”**

Morse jerks awake, looks at the paper on his bedside drawer and wonders why he would write down the name of his biological sister so many times for a second before he remembers.

He shivers, then gets up.

No more sleep tonight.

Over the next hour, he comes up with a plan.

The more and longer he sleeps, the more he turns into this world’s version of him, and the faster he forgets where he actually comes from.

So he won’t sleep through the nights anymore. Instead he’ll try and get his rest through well-timed naps throughout the day; and he’ll carry a reminder of Joyce in his wallet in case he realizes he’s slipping up.

And he’ll do his best to solve the case as quickly as possible. It doesn’t matter if he has to lie, if he has to tell people he’s a detective, if he has to hide from the man who thinks he’s his farther and those who should be his colleagues but aren’t.

He might have forgotten a lot of things, but one thing he knows with absolute certainty.

He’s going to go home.


	13. Morpheus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There was some confusion with the names of the victims - sorry about that. But I know how many chapters there will be now, and you'll get one a day until this is done. Hope you are still enjoying this!

If he were a DC, he would talk to Pamela Waters’ parents first, and so this is what he decides to do. Granted, they must have been questioned by DI Thursday already; but he still needs to know, and if he were to ask too many questions of his adoptive father, he might get suspicious.

He registers with relief that there are no police men around the house and that he doesn’t have to resort to another subterfuge to get past them.

He introduces himself as Sergeant Dupin – it’s the first name that comes to mind, and not one anyone will associate with him.

Mrs. Waters is resigned to answering more questions, while Mr. Waters seems annoyed; they immediately relax when Morse tells them he has a new theory, however.

“We have noticed some... similarities between the other girls, and I’d just like to make sure.” He doesn’t call them victims, not to the parents’ faces.

“What kind of similarities?” Morse can tell that almost immediately, a suspicion darts into their heads that he’s quick to try and dispel.

“They were all very outgoing, had many friends. To put it simply, they were very popular with their peers.”

They start talking simultaneously, and Morse has to tactfully ask them to slow down. It’s Mrs. Waters who speaks first. “Yes. She is very popular – not that it made her conceited. She’s such a sweet girl, and she loves her younger brother very much. She’s so... she’s so full of life...”

And Morse remembers something.

Later, they show him her room. It’s exactly how he would have pictured it – painted in yellow, light furniture, the room of a confident, happy young girl.

Full of life.

At Lonsdale, he and Thursday learned that this might all be about a ritual to gain immortality.

Wouldn’t it make sense to choose those as sacrifices who seemed “full of life”?

It’s another one of those thoughts that would have Jakes scoffing that he understands the killer a little too well, but it’s better than nothing.

So far, he’s met professor Lestrange and his students Hardy and Tanner – not in this universe, although he must be known to Lestrage, since they are colleagues, and he supposes Hardy and Tanner will know him from sight – and all three of them know about the grande grimoire. And Tanner has a pathological fear of death, if Hardy is to be believed.

If... He bites his lip. He’s not entirely sure Hardy is to be trusted. He certainly didn’t seem to care much about the young lives who were taken by someone who might believe in the occult.

He looks at the picture on the dresser. Just a young girl with her friends. A young, lively girl with everything to lose.

He leaves soon afterwards. 

* * *

 

Morse makes a habit of hopefully inconspicuously following Hardy and Tanner, and learning Lestrange’s schedule. The latter is not difficult with a friend like Jerome; he only has to introduce the name and wait for the information that’s sure to follow.

It seems Lestrange keeps mostly to himself and is considered eccentric “even for one of us”, which is saying something, considering Morse knows (and how he does, he doesn’t wish to elaborate, because it makes his old life ever more hazy in his mind) of a fellow member who enjoys playing the bagpipes with his windows wide open.

Apparently not even Jerome has ever exchanged more than a casual greeting with him, so Morse can’t simply make up a subject and come to him for help; no, he’ll have to think of something else.

Tanner and Hardy appear to be just normal students, except for the fact that they are studying grimoires, even in Oxford a rather strange choice of topic.

None of this helps. Morse can feel his true self slipping away further every day, and he’s no closer to finding the culprit.

He’s taken to writing down short descriptions of Joyce, now.

* * *

 

Eventually, he manages to sit next to Lestrange at lunch, and to his surprise, he can be quite social when he wants to be and chats with him about his family, making it ever more difficult to keep a grasp on reality.

Try as he might, Morse can’t bring him to change the topic.

“And how many sisters do you have?”

“Two” he answers; he’s started calling both Joan and Joyce his sisters in his head in the hope that it will make things easier. Then he realizes his mistakes and corrects himself, “Siblings. I have two smaller siblings. One brother and one sister.”

“I see.”

Somehow, Lestrange’s eyes seem more intense than they did when they came to see him.

Or maybe it’s just the exhaustion.

* * *

After a few equally frantic as fruitless days, his sleepless nights start catching up with him. He’s drinking much more coffee than he’s used to, but it only helps so much.

“Dev, there you are – good God, you look like Death warmed over. Still a much more charming picture than the Grim Reaper is usually depicted as, but –“

“Jerome” he says tiredly, rubbing his eyes. “I haven’t been sleeping well.”

“You look like you didn’t sleep at all” he points out, proving once again that he knows him better in this world than the real one. “In fact I’m tempted to put you to bed right now before you keel over during a lecture.”

“I’m fine.”

“That’s the tone you use when you aren’t.”

He sighs. “I promise I’ll get some rest tonight.”

He can’t foresee that this will unfortunately prove to be true, or the consequences it will have.

* * *

 

He’s been careful to call what the Thursdays would describe as his home at least once every day and still couldn’t prevent Mrs. Thursday insisting he come to dinner in the middle of the week – “Fred’s coming home later and later, and Joan and Sam will be both out with friends, and we might as well keep each other company.”

Morse hasn’t quite realized how much difference the lack of rest he’s gotten makes in his appearance – or rather, when he made the decision, he wasn’t thinking about the woman who raised him as her own.

She opens the door for him and immediately frowns. “Dev? What’s the matter?”

“Nothing” he replies.

“You look terribly tired” she fusses.

He shrugs. “I had a lot to do, but I’m fine, Mother.”

There is something even more dangerously seductive about calling Mrs. Thursday _mother_ than the Inspector _father_ – maybe because it makes him think of Mum, and wonder what she would say about this life where he found a new family.

“Come in”.

He doesn’t have the energy to protest when she once more robs him off his coat “What will it take for you and Fred to just leave those in this heat?” and makes him sit down instead of setting the table.

“I really could –“

“Right now I’d rather you sit down and rest, Dev. You look like you could need it.”

He really could, but he’s not about to allow himself even two consecutive hours of sleep. Even after his short naps, he has to forcefully remind himself of Joyce now, or he’ll be convinced he’s Dev Thursday for a good half hour before snapping out of it.

“Your father has been stressed, these past few days – even more so than before” she sighs as she serves them dinner.

“Oh?”

“There is a man running around pretending to be detective and investigating the crimes. They aren’t sure if he’s perhaps a reporter trying to get more information on the case, or a suspect.”

“They... do know what he looks like though, don’t they? There must be witnesses –“

“Yes, but their descriptions don’t amount to much. To be honest, from what little he told me, it could have been you!”

He swallows a bite that’s a bit too much for him and starts coughing. Mrs. Thursday immediately begins to pat his back. “You really must be exhausted –“

“I’m fine.” He manages to convince her about as well as he did Jerome. Still, they mostly make small talk, after that.

Morse does his best to convince her to let him go immediately after dinner, but instead she bustles him into the living room and on the sofa. “I’ll make us a cuppa.”

He sees her glance at the clock – past nine and no sign of DI Thursday – and feels guiltier than ever that he has only succeeded in giving him extra work so far by chasing after an impostor.

She soon returns with two cups of chamomile tea. He would have preferred coffee, but Mrs. Thursday would hardly agree with him in the state that he’s in. “I really hope Fred will come home soon. He shouldn’t be working that many hours.”

“You know Father” he replies, suppressing a yawn. The sofa is soft and comfortable, and Mrs. Thursday has only turned on the small lamp on the table next to it, plunging the room into semi-darkness. “As long as this man isn’t caught...”

“I know, I just wish he’d look after himself a bit more – and that goes for you too, young man. This was really not something I hoped you’d choose to learn from him.”

He shrugs, smiling weakly, his eyes heavy. He’ll have to get up soon, he thinks as he blinks lazily.

Mrs. Thursday gets up. “I’ll take some more tea. Do you want another cup?”

“No thank you.”

As she bustles away, he tells himself he’ll find a way to leave once she returns. Just a few more minutes, and he’ll be on his way, the night air sure to rouse him a little.

* * *

 

Win takes her time in the kitchen, careful to be quiet. Dev’s been worrying her, these past few days. And tonight he gave her something of a fright, even, he looked so utterly exhausted.

Thankfully, she learnt how to deal with situations like this in his teenage years, when he grew stubborn and would try to study all night. Get a good meal and soothing tea into him, and his tired body will do the rest.

As she hoped, by the time she returns to the living room, his eyes are closed, his head is leaning against the back of the sofa, his breaths have turned deep and even.

She debates trying to rouse him enough to get him to put on pyjamas and go to his bed, but then, the dark circles under his eyes look worse than she’s ever seen on him, and he’s not managed to finish his tea. Plus, he doesn’t even stir when she gently takes the cup out of his hands.

The sofa it is, then. Decision made, she gets a pillow and a blanket. Back in the living room, Dev has slumped even lower. She makes quick work of taking off his tie and his shoes – her poor boy doesn’t stir at all – and guides him to a lying position so he can be comfortable, although she doubts it’d make a difference now.

She runs her fingers through his hair. At least he hasn’t got a fever.

She leaves him to rest with a kiss on his forehead.

* * *

The children won’t be denied the opportunity to check up on him when they come home.

“Mum, he’s so passed out, he didn’t even stir” Joan reports, frowning. “Are you sure he’s alright?”

“Yes, dear. He just needs some rest.”

“I’d say. Those dark circles have dark circles.”

Of course Sam noticed. He’s always been very aware of what Dev’s going through at any given time.

* * *

Fred, when he finally comes home, is understandably worried. “He passed out in the living room?”

“I think he’s been pushing himself a bit too hard.”

“Tell me something new” he sighs. He goes to see if he’s alright too, of course.

She smiles. They’ve always been a close-knit family, and she’s glad they still are, even with their three children all grown up.


	14. Birthday

**Morse hasn’t really paid attention to the fact that he has a birthday coming up since Mr. Thursday told him they wanted to adopt him. There could be no better present than this, and whether he was twelve or thirteen, he was always going to be thankful for having been offered a home and – dare he say it – love.**

**That doesn’t mean the Thursdays forget, though. A week after he arrived at their house, he wakes up to find Sam already up; normally, he’s still asleep and he is extra careful not to wake him.**

**Glancing at the clock on his nightstand, another present Mr. and Mrs. Thursday apparently were more than happy to bestow on him within two days of him arriving in their home for good, he’s surprised to see that it’s past ten.**

**There’s a slight commotion by the door; he recognizes Sam’s giggle easily enough.**

**“Sh, we’re supposed to see if he’s up yet” Joan hisses, and he smiles as he gets out of bed while making enough of a noise to prove that yes, he is.**

**Even if he were still asleep, it would probably be difficult to overhear Sam’s excited squeal or Joan pronouncing that they can go downstairs now with all the gravitas of a nineteenth-century governess ruling in her charge, but it’s still fun to pretend he has no idea.**

**As he goes down, he hears Sam and Joan chuckle even more, Mrs. Thursday doing her best to hush them.**

**He clears his throat, deeming it appropriate to let them know he’s coming. “Good morning.”**

**Joan and Sam storm out of the dining room. “Morse!”**

**“Good morning” he repeats.**

**Joan grabs his hand and starts dragging him towards the door. “Come on, we got you a present!”**

**Morse suspects it was rather Mr. and Mrs. Thursday who got him the present, but doesn’t correct her, especially since he has to give his attention to Sam, who is once again babbling excitedly at him.**

**Still, he forgets to listen when he enters the dining room and sees what’s sitting in the middle of the table.**

**A record player.**

**They got him a record player.**

**“Happy birthday, Morse. Do you like it?” Mr. Thursday asks, ruffling his hair.**

**He can’t speak, but they seem to understand, because they both hug him tightly.**

**“We had a bit of a splurge, on your thirteenth” Father will tell him years later during one of their late night talks, “Money was tight for about a month after that, but we decided we couldn’t** not **do it. You’d been through so much, and you were barely in your teens.”**

* * *

**Even, he will later think, if they had known she would come and told him, he wouldn’t have been prepared for Aunt Reenie.**

**It’s about four pm, and he, Sam and Joan are kicking the ball around in the garden, Morse always careful to stay away from Mrs. Thursday’s flower bed. Joan was a little reluctant at first to play a “boys’ game” but after Morse assured her that there are actually women who like to do it, she agreed, and now seems to have a lot of fun too.**

**He doesn’t hear the door bell, but he hears their visitor. Most likely because she’s loud enough to make the whole neighbourhood aware that she is here. “Hello, Win, Fred. You both look well. Where’s my new nephew?”**

**And before he can properly react, excuse himself to Sam and Joan and go to meet her, Aunt Reenie sweeps into the garden to gather him into a hug. “Hello, Morse. I’m your new Aunt. Well, great aunt, to be precise, but it doesn’t matter; I’m not ninety yet, so you’ll just call me Aunt Reenie.”**

**Morse doesn’t quite know how to react. “I –“**

**“Win told me you like listening to classical music – finally someone with a bit of a distinguished hobby around here – and what they were planning to give you for your birthday, so I brought a few more records. I sure hope you’ll like Shostakovich and Rachmaninow, because more people have to. I brought some things the salesman assured me the young people like, too; it never hurts to have something to talk about, and you’re new at your school.”**

**“You didn’t have to –“**

**“Of course I did.”**

**And that ends that discussion.**

**As it turns out, she brought more than just the afore-mentioned composers’ records. Morse is now the owner of what could be called a music collection, and he’s busy showing Sam and Joan how to carefully place the records in the player so they don’t scratch. Music was one of the few things he learned to love at Dad’s house.**

**Later, they’re in the garden again playing, and he doesn’t mean to hear, but a few snippets of Aunt Reenie’s and Mrs. Thursday’s talk drift through the kitchen window.**

**“I’ll admit I was a bit worried dear, but I see now that there will be no problems. Not every twelve-year-old would be glad to patiently show a two-year-old how to handle records, not to mention with another toddler nipping at his feet.”**

**“Morse, Joan and Sam are already very close.”**

**“He fits right in, too. You don’t have to worry about a thing; as he grows up, everyone will tell you he’s got your chin and nose, and that will be that. When you first told me, though, I really thought... it doesn’t matter. He’s part of the family now. But tell me, dear: Can you really afford it? And be honest. I do have the money, and who should I help but my own niece?”**

**“Don’t worry, we went through it all when we realized we wanted to adopt him. Fred’s going to be made an Inspector one of these days, and even if he isn’t, we can take care of another child.”**

**“Don’t hesitate to tell me if you ever need assistance.”**

**“We won’t, Aunt Reenie.”**

**“Now that this is out of the way, you have to tell me the story in more detail. How did you ever happen across the one lonely boy in the world who could make such a good big brother?”**

**She approves of him. Morse didn’t think the day could get any better, and yet...**

* * *

**That evening, right before bedtime, Morse is reading to Joan and Sam.** Anne of Green Gables. **The librarian seemed to think that it might be too difficult to grasp for two and five-year-old children, but Morse knew better. Adults never think children can handle more than the absolute minimum.**

**Mr. Thursday clears his throat and Morse raises his head to see him standing in the doorway, getting the feeling that he has been there for a while, although he can’t understand why he would just silently stand there, looking at them.**

**“It’s time for the kiddies to go to bed, I dare say” he finally declares, and his voice sounds a bit rough. He’s blinking his eyes a lot too, and Morse worries for a moment that he’s coming down with something, but in the next moment, he talks just like he usually does when Joan and Sam start to complain. “Now, now, you’ve already been up longer than usual because of Morse’s birthday.”**

**He has to promise that he will continue reading the story tomorrow, and they finally retire after giving him some more hugs.**

**During the first few days, Morse was worried that he’d wake Sam when he went to bed, but it turned out he’s a heavy sleeper.**

**As has become their habit, even though it’s only been a week since they took him in, Morse follows him downstairs for a cup of tea before bed. Mrs. Thursday is bustling around, looking as happy as she could possibly be. “Did you have a nice birthday?”**

**He nods because talking is suddenly difficult. On his last birthday, his twelfth, Mum was already ill and they did their best to pretend it wasn’t the last one they were going to spend together, but it didn’t work.**

**Mr. Thursday pats his shoulder. “You’ll get used to it.”**

**Morse doesn’t quite get how the Thursdays always know what to say, or why it invariably helps, but he’s not going to question it.**

**“He was reading to Joan and Sam again” Mr. Thursday tells her.**

**“I can’t imagine how you do it, sweetheart. Sam never sits still when I try to.”**

**“You have to do the appropriate voices, it makes him listen.”**

**Morse thinks he doesn’t quite fit Anne, but Sam seems to like it, and Joan is happy as long as she hears a story.**

**“I’ll have to remember that” Mr. Thursday sounds amused.**

**“Here, dear” Mrs. Thursday says, handing Morse a cup of tea. “And I wanted to say – that is, we felt that –“**

**“We would have warned you if we’d known Aunt Reenie would storm in” Mr. Thursday interrupts her.**

**“Fred!”**

**“You have to admit she can be quite...”**

**“Forceful?” Morse supplies.**

**“One way to put it, lad.”**

**“She already dotes on you” Mrs. Thursday says, “I suspect right now she’ll be phoning all her friends about the newest addition to the family.”**

**Family.**

**Morse still has trouble thinking of the Thursdays as his family, but he suspects he will learn to, over time.**

* * *

**Joan and Sam give him his nickname, a few weeks later.**

**He had a play date with one of the other young boys from their street, while Morse and Joan were playing with dolls, a pastime as yet deemed a bit too grown-up for him, or at least that’s what Mrs. Thursday said to Sam when he seemed to wonder whether to stay or to go.**

**He comes back with a question. “Bobby said Morse isn’t a real name. I told him it was, but he said you ought to have a Christ- a Christi-“**

**“A Christian name” Morse says quickly, like ripping off a band aid. They have to learn eventually. “Mine is Endeavour. I don’t like it much, though.”**

**Sam frowns at him. “En-dev-or?”**

**“Almost” he replies.**

**“En-dev-dev –“**

**“Dev” Joan suddenly decides, “Dev sounds nice.”**

**He has to admit that he vastly prefers it to his full name.**

**From that moment on, the children persist in calling him Dev. Mr. and Mrs. Thursday make sure he’s comfortable with it while still addressing him as Morse, but not for long.**

**A few weeks in, Mr. Thursday comes home from work and calls out, “Dev, Joan, Sam?” because they’re busy reading and haven’t noticed him yet.**

**He doesn’t even seem to realize.**

**Mrs. Thursday follows suit soon afterwards, asking him one morning, “Dev, would you like another cup of tea?”**

**Morse never corrects them.**

**He has realized that it makes him feel more like a Thursday.**

**And that he likes that feeling very much.**

It’s his own fault, really. He should have known that a week full of work plus one of Mother’s meals would mean he’d fall asleep on the sofa.

Of course she took of his tie and shoes and tucked him in, as if he were still a little boy.

Dev blinks and sits up. Only six thirty; more than enough time to have breakfast with the others and head over to Lonsdale for his nine o’ clock lecture.

As he goes to the bathroom to wash up, something’s nagging at him in the back of his mind. Almost as if he forgot something, something important. He dismisses the thought because if it was that important, it’s not likely he would have forgotten.

He’s got the kettle brewing and the eggs cooking by the time Mother comes down. “Good morning, Dev. Sleep well?”

“Good morning. Yes, thank you: I must have been more tired than I realized.”

“Always the same with you and your father when you get lost in your work. Two peas in a pod. At least your younger siblings know to take a step back, although I have no idea where they got it from.”

Younger siblings.

There it is again, that feeling, that little nudge telling him there’s something he should know. Something of vital importance, to him, to everything.  

If only he could recall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Plot twist!


	15. A Different Life

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a bit too much fun with this chapter.

“Morning. Hey Dev, Mum told us you were asleep in the living room when we came home last night: What was that about?“

Just like Sam to immediately start asking question. Joan has always been more content to let him answer hers in his own time. “I was tired and passed out; it happens. Two eggs each?”

“Sure” Sam answers for both of them, grinning brightly.

Joan is already on her second cup of tea; Dev knows well enough that she’ll only properly wake up after her third. “When did Father come home?”

“Eleven-ish. Mum all but had to put him to bed, but that seems to have been the common theme yesterday.”

“You won’t let me live this down, will you.”

“Younger brother privilege, Dev.”

“Catch your breath to cool your eggs.”

“Now, what do I have to hear?” Mother asks, sweeping into the kitchen fully dressed. “Don’t tell me you’re being influenced by your students. It should be the other way around.”

“I can assure you I always try to set a good example” he says light-heartedly, putting her customary breakfast egg in front of her. Mother prefers to have a sandwich in the middle of the day, rather than a full breakfast.

“There you are. Win said you all but passed out at dinner table yesterday.” Of course Father would be more worried about that than the fact that he himself barely made it home yesterday. But the last thing Dev wants to do is worry him even more with everything that’s going on. The murders, and now the man who’s pretending to be a detective...

Again that niggling feeling at the back of his head.

“I think I spread myself a little thin in the last few weeks. I’ll be more careful”.

Joanie finishes her third cup of tea and decides to join the conversation. “I agree. You already look more like yourself.”

He doesn’t quite understand what it means, but he learned long ago not to question his baby sister.

Mother makes him take a sandwich with him, of course, and he leaves for his morning lecture after bestowing quick hugs on all of them.

* * *

“Devy, I didn’t lend you my Diogenes Laertios, did I?”

“Sorry, no” he answers without looking up from the paper he’s grading. Jerome often comes in without knocking when he’s in a hurry. “You can have mine, though – I am rather sure I won’t be needing it in the next few days. Third shelf from above to your right.”

“You are a life saviour, Endeavour Thursday. Never change.”

Again, that... feeling at the back of his mind as if he has forgotten something.

He dismisses the thought.

* * *

He’s just come back from his afternoon lecture and put the kettle on when there is a tentative knock on his door. Assuming it to be one of the shyer or newer students – even better he’ll have tea to offer them in that case – he hastens to open it.

As it turns out, he’s never seen the young woman standing in front of him before.

 _No. That’s not true_. “Joyce?” he asks.

She nods. “Morse, is that you? I – I got your letter, but I didn’t know what to answer and so I – the porter told me where to find you –“

He blinks. He’s never written Joyce a letter, surely –

**Father looks much more relaxed than before their talk, and Dev is glad that they at least forego the hat stand rule at times like this. As he gets up, he asks casually, “Have you heard anything yet?”**

**He shakes his head. “No.” He empties his glass and continues just as forcefully casual, “It’s only been a week.” He went back and forth for several months before he finally decided to write to Joyce.**

**“That’s true. You just have to give it some time.”**

Joyce suddenly launches herself into his arms and his confusion vanishes. “Oh, Morse!”

“It’s Dev now.”

“Yes, yes, of course. You signed your letter.” She draws back and smiles; her eyes are wet and Dev registers without surprise that he is feeling decidedly teary-eyed too. “I was so glad to hear from you.”

He realizes the door is still open and ushers her in. 

* * *

Thank God no students drop by today. Instead, he and Joyce talk over several cups of tea. Dev feels nothing as he learns of his father’s death, but he never expected to, not after so many years have passed. He’s more worried about the debts Joyce and Gwen have to carry. “And you’re sure you don’t need help?”

“Mum got a job and ordered me not to think about it” she answers. “And I thought... I thought now that... I thought I might find work in Oxford.” She smiles shyly.

He squeezes her hand. “That sounds like a wonderful idea.”

* * *

After Joyce has brought him up to speed on her life, she demands to hear all about his, despite his protests, and Dev spends the next hour telling her about growing up as the Thursday’s oldest son.

**While Dev eventually finds a few boys at school he would dare call his friends, he prefers Joan’s and Sam’s company to that of other children. They’re always glad to see, play with him or have him read to them; and in fact they soon start picking up a few letters by themselves.**

**One day, Mr. Thursday comes home to find him teaching them the alphabet. “You’ll be making scholars of us all, Dev.”**

**“I can try” he answers. He’s noticed that Mr. and Mrs. Thursday don’t seem to mind when he gets a little flippant now and then, and indeed he only chuckles as he takes off his hat.**

**“Good luck with your endeavours, then.”**

**They grin at one another.**

* * *

**The Thursdays haven’t been living in Oxford long, meaning they are only now growing a small circle of friends and acquaintances.**

**None of those ever introduced to the children ever realize Morse isn’t their biological son.**

**A few months in, a couple moves in down the street. They have the Gibrans over for dinner now and then, or vice versa. One day, Mr. Thursday mentions that he and Mrs. Thursday have been married for ten years, and Mr. Gibran throws Morse a look and mumbles something that sounds like “Small wonder in those confusing times.”**

**To Morse’s surprise, neither of the Thursdays corrects them.**

* * *

 

**A few weeks later, they’re at the park. Once again, Morse doesn’t mean to eavesdrop, but the wind carries the voice of Mrs. Thursday and the mother of the two little girls who are playing with Joan and Sam (Joan is using every opportunity to point out that they are more girl than boys for once).**

**“I have to say, Mrs. Thursday, your oldest really has your eyes.”**

**He smiles to himself.**

* * *

 

**On the day Dev turns fourteen, he realizes that he can’t recall a year ever passing that fast. He’s doing well at school, the Thursdays still seem to like him as much as when they adopted him, and he’s grown several inches.**

**And there’s something he wants for his birthday, but he isn’t sure how toil ask. It’s been a year; maybe he missed his chance.**

**But, as Mr. Thursday always says, it doesn’t hurt to ask, and so he gently asks that evening, “I know how this may sound, but... there’s something else I’d like to have.”**

**Mr. Thursday puts his cup of tea down. “A bit late for asking, but –“**

**“Your name” Dev blurts out, staring into his own tea. “I’d like Thursday to be my last name.”**

**When they don’t answer immediately, he looks up. They are looking at one another, and Mrs. Thursday sniffles a bit and pretends to cough so she can wipe her eyes.**

**“Of course, Dev” Mr. Thursday eventually answers, his voice sounding foreign, “We’d be glad to have you officially become a Thursday.”**

**A few weeks later, he does.**

* * *

**A little while after that, one of Mr. Thursday’s colleagues drops by in the evening because of their newest case and Dev opens the door. “Father!” he calls out. “It’s for you!”**

**Mr. Thursday needs longer than usual to emerge from the dining room, and it’s only as he squeezes his shoulder on his way past his colleague, harder than he usually does, that Dev realizes he called him Father for the first time.**

* * *

**Calling Mrs. Thursday Mother after that is only a matter of time. It takes a little longer because he still gets a lump in his throat when he thinks of Mum, but she understands.**

**It happens after she falls down the stairs. Morse is in the garden with the kiddies when she does, and the first to be at her side, his heart beating painfully in his chest at seeing her splayed on the floor.**

**To his relief, she has only sprained her ankle, and after the doctor’s been to see her and they’ve calmed down Joan and Sam, he spends the next few days making sure she doesn’t have to move as long as he’s in the house.**

**“That’s really nice of you, Dev” she tells him on the third day when he brings her a cup of tea, “But the doctor said a little walking wouldn’t hurt me.”**

**“It’s no problem, Mother.”**

**They stare at one another. Then she wordlessly draws him into a hug.**

* * *

**Once both Joan and Sam are in school, Dev takes it upon himself to make sure they never have trouble with their homework. He doesn’t do it for them, that would be detrimental, but he is always ready to help.**

**One day, a newly made DI Thursday comes home to find Dev and Sam in the dining room; their eldest is patiently explaining equations to their youngest, and he decides not to disturb them.**

**Win’s in the living room sewing. “He’s been helping him for a while now” she says after he greets her with a kiss. “We came close to tears at one point, but now Sam’s got it.” Her eyes soften. “I know money was tight for a while, but it was a blessed day when he decided to adopt him.”**

**“That it was” he eagerly agrees.**

* * *

**By the time Dev is sixteen and his voice has broken, Father suggests he should try and find a choir to sing in, since he enjoys humming arias and the popular songs Joan and Sam like to himself.**

**He thinks it’s a wonderful idea.**

**His family doesn’t miss a single performance.**

* * *

**Dev’s time at school passes without major incidents. He grows a bit taciturn, as Win puts it one day, during puberty, but it’s nothing like the horror stories Fred gets to hear at the station about the other officer’s children.**

**Quite frankly, he would have been surprised if it had been.**

**Still, there are a few hiccups.**

**One evening, a door slams shut and Sam marches down the stairs, looking as indignant as a six-year-old can manage to, and proceeds to draw in the living room, hauntingly denying to answer all questions.**

**When Fred goes to investigate, Dev looks immediately apologetic. “He wanted to listen to Carol Carr. Again. I’m sorry.”**

**“You should tell him that, son.”**

**Still – based on them playing together not half an hour later, Fred decides they got rather lucky.**

* * *

**“Dev! Letter for you!” Mother calls out as soon as he returns from school, and he swallows. Sam and Joan, who are already back home, immediately come to his side as if they can feel that he needs them.**

**“Open it” mother encourages him, “It’s just a letter. It won’t bite. And we promised you we’ll find a way.”**

**That may be, but he can hardly imagine...**

**He tears the envelope open and peruses the contents. “I got the scholarship” he breathes; Joan and Sam squeal and pounce at him and Mother looks at him with pride in her eyes.**

**That evening, Father comes home with the new Rosalind Calloway LP as a treat.**

* * *

**It doesn’t take him long to realize that, even though they do their best to pretend, no member of his family truly likes Susan. Joan is the most opposed to their marriage – at the time, violently in love, he thinks she’s jealous, but he’ll later believe it was her sisterly instincts – but they are all nice to her when he brings her over. They’d never treat her like Susan’s mother does him, he knew that before.**

**When she ends their engagement, he does what any heartbroken boy would do and runs home.**

**He stays in bed for three days.**

**It’s Joan and Sam who eventually drag him out, claiming he has to watch the new horror film with them or they’ll be too scared. Seeing as they are now fifteen and eighteen years old, he isn’t quite ready to believe that, but he is too tired to protest.**

**And sitting in a theatre feeling Sam jump now and then and listening to Joan’s sniggering does him surprisingly good.**

**Later that evening, he and Dad have a drink in the dining room.**

**“Look, Dev” he tells him quietly, “I won’t say something along the lines of there being plenty more fish in the sea. That’s not what you want to hear. You’re young and in love, and I remember that feeling. And maybe you think the love of your life just left you. But perhaps you just dodged a bullet. We’ll never know. My point is, we’re all standing behind you, and you can get through this.”**

**He nods, his eyes dry. He’s already cried enough tears.**

**Mother feeds him up for a week before he returns to Lonsdale. Jerome is ecstatic to see him back so soon.**

* * *

**He might be twenty-six and working his way up in the world, but that doesn’t mean he ever forgets that he’s a son and a big brother, too; Joan and Sam are as likely to come to him with their problems than to their parents, and he himself finds in them good friends and confidants he can count on.**

**One evening, Joan is suddenly standing in front of his door, tears running down her cheeks.**

**Dev is going to kill Cory Thaters, the boy she was going out with. They’ll never find his body.**

**“Oh, don’t do that” she huffs. “I just wanted to calm down before going home.”**

**He understands she simply wants his company and puts the kettle on.**

* * *

**He’s barely made it through the front door when Sam dashes towards him like he used to do when they were kids. “I GOT IN!”**

**“I told you you could do it” he wheezes – in his enthusiasm, Sam squeezes him a bit too tightly.**

**“I would never have done it if it weren’t for you!”**

**Dev reaches up to ruffle his hair. “Pah. That was all you.”**

* * *

Dev takes a deep breath. It has been a while since he’s talked that much when he’s not holding a lecture.

Joyce takes his hand. “I am so glad you found a good family.”

“They’ll be very happy to meet you.”

“You think so”?

He nods. “They were the ones who told mne I should write to you when I mentioned I’d been thinking about it.”

She smiles wildly. “I’d like that.”

“I’ll tell them all about you tonight, maybe we can don Sunday dinner. If Mother and Father don’t insist on having you over sooner.”

She immediately agrees.

Even after she has left – they both decided they needed a little break after the emotional afternoon they had – Dev can’t quite believe it. He got his other little sister back.

* * *

From the moment he moved out, Dev has been told again and again that he can simply spontaneously come home whenever he wants to, and Mother greets him with her usual enthusiasm and gentle smile. He waits until they are all sitting together at dinner – Dad having come home on time for once, looking defeated – before breaking the news.

Immediately questions start coming. Does she have lodgings? Is there anything she needs? Does she want to come over tonight? He has to interrupt Mother several times to ensure her that yes, he knows where Joyce currently resides, he has her number and they think that Sunday would be the best day.

“We’ll be glad to have here” Father says, perhaps unconsciously echoing what he told Dev in the park all those years ago.

“So much for being more boys than girls, Sam” Joan says.

“She’s not –“

“She’s Dev’s sister, so she’s ours by default.”

Sam grumbles a little, but it’s only for show. Then he says, “It’s amazing you recognized her at once. If I hadn’t seen Joan since we were small, I don’t think I’d have known her. She actually grew up pretty, imagine that.”

“No one told me you’d be growing so tall either” Dev drawls.

It’s a good evening.

* * *

Later, he’s having tea by himself in the kitchen, the radio quietly playing in the background. The others understood he wanted to be alone for a bit and went upstairs to bed.

As he’s sipping the hot drink, he remembers what Sam told him.

_It’s amazing you recognized her at once._

It is. Before today, he didn’t see her for over two decades, and yet – and yet –

The nagging voice at the back of his mind pipes up again, but this time, what it’s saying is loud and clear.

_But she looked like she does now when Dad died. When I went home –_

His cup falls down on the floor and shatters.


	16. Solution

Morse automatically reaches down to collect the pieces and promptly cuts himself. The sharp pain pierces through the numbness in his mind.

_I almost lost myself._

The thought comes unbidden, as terrifying as it is unbelievable, and makes him feel a dread he once experienced staring into the eyes of a man-eater.

It has the same effect, too.

By the time Thursday enters the kitchen, he’s retching into the sink.

“What – Dev!”

A warm hand, rubbing up and down his back. Gentle touches guiding him to a chair once he’s stopped being sick. A glass of water being presented to him.

He carefully takes a few sips, and the sick feeling passes.

“What happened?” Thursday demands, looking at Morse like he does at Sam or Joan when something’s wrong, as a father who wants to make his child feel better, and it’s not right. It’s not right, and Morse doesn’t know if he can find the energy to fight it for much longer. It’s possible that he won’t come back after he goes to sleep.

“Did you hit your head? Are you feeling dizzy? In pain?” Thursday continues and he realize she has to give him an answer.

“I’m fine, s-“ He almost said sir. It wouldn’t help.

“Like hell you are. You’re bleeding, and you just brought up your dinner! I’ll get you a band-aid –”

As he storms out, Morse realizes he’s not wearing his pyjamas yet but that he’s made himself comfortable by slipping in one of his oldest shirts, as he’s wont to do –

 _You shouldn’t know this. You shouldn’t know this. You_ shouldn’t _know this._

“There” Thursday returns with the promised band-aid. “And now you’ll tell me what’s going on. You look white as a sheet.”

The mixture of worry and anger – at himself for not noticing that something was amiss sooner, not at Morse – reminds him of the time he came home after Susan and he knew immediately –

_Not home. Stop it._

“I can’t.”

“What do you mean, you can’t?” Thursday is carefully cleaning the wound, frowning in concentration. “You know you can tell us anything.”

Still feeling weak, Morse decides to tell the truth. “You wouldn’t believe me.”

Thursday raises his eyes to Morse’s. “Try me.”

And he knows he won’t be able to refuse him. This man has made more people confess than anyone else at Cowley station; and furthermore, Morse trusts him, not only as a man would trust his superior officer, but how a son –

_Stop it._

Thursday squeezes his shoulder. “Dev. Something’s been off for a while, hasn’t it? I and your mother noticed, and so did Joan and Sam. Talk to me, lad, please.”

It’s the _please_ that does it.

He takes a deep breath and starts talking. He tells him everything, about his home in Lincolnshire, how he grew up, how he left college, went to the army, then the police; and he reveals how he truly met Thursday and his family, as a grown man and not a helpless little boy who needed a home...

He lets him finish, sitting across from him at the kitchen table, as they have done many times before ( _no you haven’t, stay concentrated, you have to_ ) and then takes a deep breath.

“Dev, you have to know what you just told me is impossible. You’re our boy. Have been since you were twelve. We adopted you and –“

“I know you think that, sir, and I know that in this world, it is the truth, but –“ He stops talking when he realizes Thursday flinched when he called him sir. _Flinched_. As if the thought of Morse doing so causes him physical distress.

He wants to reach out to him like the son Thursday knows would, and restrains himself.

“What you are saying is impossible” he insists.

“Let me prove it to you. I know all about the cases we worked together.”

And he starts talking again.

Even as he does so, he can feel his other memories, the other ones, the wrong ones, press in on them, threatening to overcome him.

**“Hey Dev, guess who I met today.”**

**“A suspect.”**

**Father snorts. “Very funny, young man. No, I meant someone else.” He passes him one of his own records, one Dev was rather sure he kept at Lonsdale. “Pinter let me in while you were holding a lecture.”**

**That explains it.**

**He stares at the signature. “You met Rosalind Calloway?”**

**“Yes. Very polite. She’s married now and has all but settled down in Oxford.”**

**Dev purses his lips. He’s not someone to believe in idle gossip, but there are a few things he has heard through his membership of the choir in a few years...**

**“What is it?” Father leans forward.**

**He shrugs. “I can’t say for sure, of course; people are always eager to throw dirt, especially when someone famous decides to lead a private life; but there has been some gossip that Rosalind Calloway threw herself away.”**

**“I’ll keep it in mind.”**

**As it turns out, it’s a good thing he does.**

* * *

 

**“The score of what?” Dev presses the phone closer to his ear.**

**“The snow maiden, that’s what they said.”**

**He swallows. “Father, she dies at the end. She melts.”**

**He curses and hangs up without another word. Dev can’t blame him.**

* * *

**“To think that you would just –“**

**“Win, I knew he would go after a police man instead of the girl. Dev might not be particularly fond of Tosca, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t memorized my fair share of opera trivia over the years.”**

* * *

**“I can’t believe she actually had a weapon on her.”**

**“You can say that again.” Father takes a deep dreg out of his pipe. “Almost shot Jakes, too. Thank God for Dev’s gossip on other Oxford dons and their straying wives.”**

* * *

 

It’s helpless, Morse soon realizes, not just because Thursday thinks all of this is impossible – and a few weeks ago, Morse would have agreed – but because (and this one feels like a slap to his face) Thursday is desperate to believe in this world. That’s how fond he is of Dev.

And it’s that realization that suddenly makes him confident he can deal with this.

For, with the clarity only born out of desperation, he knows that Thursday won’t remember a single word of his tomorrow. It would be detrimental to whatever is going on if he could convince others of the truth.

And so, with a coldness he wouldn’t have thought himself capable of, he lies to Thursday. He stops talking abruptly and passes a hand across his forehead. “Father? What’s going on?”

With relief in his eyes, Thursday reaches forward and presses a hand against his forehead. “Good to have you back, Dev. You were talking... absolute madness. You were making no sense at all.”

“I think seeing Joyce unsettled me more than I believed” he mumbles, leaning into his touch like a child seeking reassurance from its parent.

Thursday’s other hand finds his shoulder and squeezes it. “You’ve not got a fever, that’s a good sign. Best you go to bed and get a good night’s sleep. Everything will make more sense tomorrow.”

He nods, doing his best to look demure and slightly embarrassed, and allows Thursday to march him up to his and Sam’s room.

At first he wants to get out of bed as soon as the door closes behind him, but then he remembers; and just as he suspected, ten minutes later the door opens again, Thursday checking on his sons with the familiarity of an experienced parent.

Ten minutes after that, Morse steals downstairs again. He won’t sleep until he has solved the case, until he has fixed everything.

The determination settled deep into his bones the moment he saw the pain in DI Thursday’s eyes. It’s one thing to go after Morse. He’s grown used to it, really.

It’s another to break Thursday’s heart. And not just his; doubtless he’d get the same reaction from the entire family, should he decide to speak out.

And the next day, everything would be forgotten. That’s how it works.

He sits down in the kitchen again, the lack of the splinters of the broken cup showing what Thursday did in the ten minutes between showing Morse to bed and checking up on him.

There has to be a clue. There are always clues.

Joyce saved him today, as she has down countless times before –

 _Joyce_.

And suddenly, all uncertainties clear away.

That shrewd glance. Those eyes, reptile-like, prying. _How many sisters do you have?_

And even more. _The girl talking to a professor, the girl who looks like the one in the picture Jakes will show him later –_

Lestrange. He was behind this from the beginning, and when he noticed Morse remembering, he sent him his little sister, his real one, so she could be incorporated into his new world and he would lose his anchor –

He takes a deep breath. There is no point in rushing, not now.

Lestrange has the knowledge. He is an old man, a hermit, no significant relationships in his life. So why should he not be searching for his lost youth? Many, Morse dares say, have done the same over the centuries.

Immortality. He’s trying to exchange the girl’s lives for his own –

And then he remembers.

_Pamela Waters is still missing and the clock is ticking when Morse figures it out._

_It’s when Tanner, who they are talking to for a third time, starts complaining. “Who told you to go after me in the first place?”_

_Morse’s mind immediately goes to Hardy, but then it’s one step further when he realizes._

_The only reason they ever knew about Tanner was Hardy, and the only reason they ever thought about Hardy, a student who has done nothing but study his subject – just like Tanner – is –_

_“Sir” he draws him to the side and murmurs, “Lestrange”._

_They step out of the interrogation room. “Are you sure?” he immediately asked._

_“When we talked to him again” Morse says, his mind whirling, “He quoted Tennyson.”_

_“so?”_

_“Here at the quiet limit of the world, a white-hair’d shadow roaming like a dream” Morse repeats. “It’s from Tithonos. It’s about an immortal man.”_

_“You mean –“_

_“Exactly.”_

_As always, they move with efficiency after that._

_They are just in time; when they return to Lonsdale, they spread out and find Lestrange and Pamela in the basement; he’s about to cut the girl’s throat when Morse jumps at him and brings them all to the ground, Strange grabbing Pamela while Thursday helps him to wrestle Lestrange down._

_After that, he is remarkably calm, and Morse doesn’t know why this feels so anticlimactic. They saved the girl and got the man who killed the others; that should be enough, certainly?_

_And yet –_

_Something about the way he looks at Morse in the interrogation room –_

_“I just wanted to recapture what I lost. I have done great things in my life, Inspector. These girls – they just run around, wide-eyed, they don’t do anything to help society. Why should I not take a little from them to gain more years?”_

_“They were not yours to take” Thursday answer through pressed teeth._

_“And yet I did, and I would have continued. After the one you saved, I only needed one more. Just one more. I needed one more girl. If only I didn’t have to keep them for a few days for the ritual to work...” he looks at Morse. “And without you, Constable, I would have –“_

_“But you didn’t” Morse says tiredly. “We got you, professor.”_

_“You got me.” His eyes, studying Morse. “And I won’t forget it. I’ll see you soon, Constable – in another place.”_

Back then, he thought he meant the court room, but now he knows better. Lestrange changed the world just so he could continue with his practice of killing young girls to live forever.

And he was clever about it, too. Changing Morse’s memories from the case from the first, making him think the fourth girl had already been murdered when he woke up, just to confuse him –

Morse presses the palm of his right hand against his injured finger. He needs the paint to keep him focused.

Tomorrow. This all ends tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments Please? ^_^


	17. Turning Point

He doesn’t sleep, but then he doubts he could even if he tried. He sits in the kitchen and slowly watches the dawn break, not wishing to go to the living room and see the proofs of a life lived among a loving family cherishing every moment they got to be together.

This will be difficult enough as it is. He’ll have to manipulate Thursday even more than he did tonight, and he’ll have to be subtle about it; and then he’ll have to find a way to get to Lestrange while he’s in custody.

Granted, he could attempt to confront him; but that would be risking Pamela’s life, and he cannot do that. She’s so young, and must be terrified.

So getting Lestrange arrested it is.

When it’s time for the Thursdays to get up, he tiptoes back upstairs to make it seem like he simply woke up early – believable enough since it’s natural he would be a bit excited after seeing Joyce again for the first time in decades.

This time, it’s Inspector Thursday who comes downstairs first. Just as well. Morse isn’t sure he could stomach another family meal, not when he knows he’s about to give it all up.

And give it up, he must. Lestrange has done a good job, he will admit that – amongst other things, the temptation to stay and let Dev Thursday take over is always beckoning. He has his work at university, he has friends, and most important of all – he now has a family worth the name; a father who looks at him with pride in his eyes; a mother always ready to give him unconditional love; a brother and sister who look up to him – no, two sisters, for he now also has Joyce; and yet he has to give it all up.

“Dev, feeling better?” Thursday asks immediately as he enters the kitchen, and he realizes that he must be remembering that he made some kind of scene last night.

“Yes, Father, thank you.”

He clasps his shoulder. “We all feel a bit overwhelmed now and then. Nothing shameful about it. I’ll tell Win about it myself, make sure she’s not too worried.”

“Thank you” he repeats, still a bit helpless in the face of so much care bestowed on him.

“And the hand?”

“I barely feel the wound anymore.”

“Good” Thursday says, moving around him with a familiarity that makes his heart ache once more.

He takes a deep breath. Careful, now. “Father, there is something I have to tell you. About the case. It’s just university gossip, mind –“

“Your university gossip has helped us out more times than I can count. Out with it.”

“There’s a professor at Lonsdale – Lestrange, he’s called, and he’s...” Morse hesitates.

“A bit strange?” Thursday prompts, chuckling about his own joke.

“More than that. Pinter assures me he’s been growing very irritable, and... there’s talk that he’s become too obsessed with his subject.”

“And that’s saying something for Oxford.”

He nods.

“We’ll check it out. Thanks, Dev.”

“Always glad to help” he answers, his throat dry.

Somehow, he manages to escape before Mrs. Thursday and the others get up, insisting that it would fit his schedule better to have a quick breakfast at college. Thursday makes him promise that he will indeed eat something and Morse all but flees the house he will never see like this, as his home, again.

* * *

He expects something to happen the whole day, acting like he’s feeling sick and having Jerome hold his lecture in exchange for yet another promise that he will take care of himself then lying in waiting by Lestrange’s lodgings, hidden in the shadows.

From his hiding spot, he also has a good view of the porter’s lodge. He’s not surprised when DI Thursday shows up alone to make a few enquiries before he talks to Lestrange, but it utterly confuses him when Pinter points at the door leading to the basement –

He almost curses out loud when he realizes. Pinter is not a friend. Pinter is an accomplice. An accomplice who was put into the position of porter, which he doesn’t occupy in the real world, to keep an eye on Morse, to enforce the fantasy whenever necessary...

Once he’s gone back into the lodge and Thursday has disappeared into the basement, Morse acts.

He arrives just in time to find Thursday pointing his gun at Lestrange, who is holding a knife to Pamela’s throat. Lestrange’s eyes (how Morse didn’t notice the first time they spoke how reptile-like they are he will never – no, of course, glasses, he was wearing glasses; he probably doesn’t need them here, not anymore, because the ritual is working, even if it’s not yet complete) slide over to him and he grins. “Constable. Here we are again.”

“What –“ Thursday glances at him. “Dev, what are you doing here!?”

“It could easily be said, Inspector, that Constable Morse is the reason we find ourselves in our current predicament.”

“He’s not a constable” Thursday snaps. “Wait – are you the reason he’s been so confused these past two weeks? That scene in the kitchen yesterday –“ he blinks. “How did I forget about that?”

“You’d be surprised what you can do once you dare go where others fear to tread, Inspector” Lestrange says calmly, as calmly as the hand holding the knife. “Some sacrifices must be made, but –“

“Then why not just kill me?” Morse interrupts him. “Why go through it all just to give me another life?”

Lestrange actually looks scandalized. “I would never take a life if it wasn’t absolutely necessary.”

“And yet you’d slaughter five young girls to live longer.”

“Like I said, it’s necessary.”

Pamela’s eyes are wide; there is nothing in them but fear and panic. Morse can’t even imagine what she must have been going through while he was slowly slipping into the comfortable skin of Fred Thursday.

“And you have to admit I was nice about it. You were the one who figured it out, who had me thrown into prison. I could have locked you up yourself – and you would have been guilty of what I decided you had done, too; or I could have made you homeless, an opium addict – whatever I chose as your punishment; but instead I have you what you wanted most! You have a career, a family – I even gave you your sister!”

“So that I would be stuck here forever!”

“Would it have been so bad?”

Morse swallows. “No” he concedes, “But it wouldn’t have been real.”

“It is real – I changed time for you! The world! It’s as real as anything is ever going to get!”

“It’s still not right.”

“Alright, this ends now” Thursday decides. “Dev, please – go and call reinforcements. It seems clear that Pinter is in on it, but –“

He stops talking because the very man he’s speaking about has crept up behind them and brings down a cricket bat on his head.

“Sir!” Morse manages to catch him just in time while Lestrange starts yelling at his accomplice.

“You idiot! We could have used him!”

“He was about to –“

“He would have made things easier. You see, he might have convinced our friend here to take the deal.”

DI Thursday’s skull seems to be intact, thank God. Morse breathes a sigh of relief and stands up.

“There will be no deal” he says firmly.

“Oh? Have you thought about that? Just imagine – you can both walk out of here, not a scratch on you, as father and son, as you both would so like it to be.”

Morse reminds himself that Lestrange made the Thursdays care for him that way. There is no reason to think they would ever have chosen to adopt him, if they had met under similar circumstances.

Lestrange must have guessed what he was thinking, for he starts to laugh. “Do you really believe that? It’s much easier to get something out of people that’s already there – only buried deeply. That man cares for you like he does for his own blood.”

“All the more reason not to deceive him” Morse says.

“How often do I have to tell you? It would be real. Why can none of you comprehend –“

With a swift kick, Morse disarms Pinter and wrenches the bat out of his hands.

“What do you think you’re going to do with that?” he asks, clearly bewildered. “I still have the girl –“

“First of all” Morse announces, “I am going to do this”.

And he lets the bat crack down on Pinter’s head like he did with DI Thursday.

“Never was up for the work” Lestrange mumbles, “But the only one who would listen –“

“And now” Morse says coldly – for his anger has burned out and there is nothing but coldness in him, dread of the life he could have and the one he needs to get back to in equal measure, the fear that the offer might prove tempting after all – “I am going to bludgeon you to death.”

Lestrange’s eyes widen. “You can’t do that!”

Morse was right – the one thing that scares a man desperate for immortality is death.

“I can and I will.”

“But you’ll – you’ll be a murderer! My death will not change anything, you know. You’ll be a murderer, Thursday will have to live with that –“

“You’ll be taken off the streets though” Morse says gently. “And that is enough for me.”

And Lestrange looks at him and sees his death written upon the face of the man he give a different life to in order to escape him.

His mouth turns into a thin line. “And what do I get? Prison again?”

“You get to live. Isn’t that what you want most?”

The hand that’s holding the knife finally starts shaking as he takes a few loud breaths, then with an expression of pain on his face, he pulls a small bag out of his pocket. “Here. Burn this and return to your empty life. That’s what one gets for wanting to do some good –“

“It was good” Morse admits. He has to say it out loud once, if only to a murderer in the dark. “It was very good, Professor Lestrange. That’s why I know it could never be real, not the way I want it.”

DI Thursday starts to stir, and Morse quickly leans down to get the matches he always carries with him to light his pipes. “It’s going to be alright... Father” he murmurs, for the last time, then he stands up straight and looks at Pamela. “You’ll be fine. I promise.”

He lights the match and burns the bag.

And it all turns black.

* * *

 

He wakes up disoriented. For a moment, he wonders if he had too much to drink last night – an occurrence that is becoming all too common; but no; yesterday they finally arrested the man who has been responsible for three committed and one attempted murder within the last two months, and even Morse was too tired to go to a pub.

It’s the familiarity and not the strangeness of the situation that brings Morse out of his stupor this time and he sits up and takes in his flat.

All as he left it – no, as he never left it. As it’s always been, and as it will be for a long time to come, since he’s busy paying Dad’s bills.

He swallows, then gets up to wash himself and put on different clothes.

At least it’s Saturday. He won’t have to go to work and pretend.

He hoped he wouldn’t remember what it felt like, being cared for, belonging somewhere.

And then, in his empty flat, hating himself for his weakness, he bursts into tears as a young boy would have if a kind-hearted man had told him he and his wife wanted to adopt him, and he doesn’t dare to think about it too much for the fear that he would find they are not tears of relief and joy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, this was very obvious from the start. Oh well... at least we got some good angst in, right? ;P


	18. In A Flash

The first few weeks are difficult. As hard as it was in the beginning of his adventures in the alternate world not to slip up and accidentally call DI Thursday “sir”, it’s now about as taxing not to let the word “Father” pass his lips when they’re discussing a case.

He tries not to think of it and instead goes through Lestrange’s lodgings one more time – first to the bewilderment, than to the astonishment of his colleagues when he finds proof that a pickpocket called Toby Pinter has actively been helping the professor in the murders.

So that’s what he got. A position of authority and trust, of easy comfort.

Morse supposes it’s as good a reason as any.

Soon after Pinter’s arrest, Lestrange goes insane and is locked into an asylum, or whatever they call those places some in the precinct believe Morse should be sent to as well. He’s not surprised.

He’s got other things to worry about.  

Thankfully, his contact with the rest of the Thursday family is limited – for the first week or two. Then, Thursday, observing that he looks “even paler than usual” (and it might be true that he’s tried to medicate himself with more drink than is advisable) all but drags him into his house one evening to “get a good meal in him.”

It’s almost too much to bear. At the same time, it’s too different and yet too similar to the family meals he had to carefully navigate in the strange world Lestrange sent him to. He has to bite his lips several times not to call Joan “Joanie” or inquire after Sam too often; all in all, it’s one of the most stressful experiences he can recall, and yet he’s subjected to it at least once a week now, because Mrs. Thursday will not be denied when it comes to feeding him, now.

Still, Morse thinks he can get used to it. He has already dealt with enough in his life, he can deal with this, too.

And then the ground shifts under his feet again.

Joan starts up showing at his place, or calling him to have a quick drink at the pub. She’s not trying to ask him out (and thank God for that, for his stomach lurches at the very thought, these days, it would be like lusting after Joyce, even though it shouldn’t be) but rather seems to be enjoying his company, and he has to be careful to differentiate between what’s really happened and what would have happened in that other world constantly.

“Alright” she begins one day, sneaking a chip from his plate, her eyes sparkling in that mischievous manner of hers he remembers from when they were children and she wanted to do something forbidden ( _only that never happened_ ) “I need your advice, and you have to promise me you won’t tell anyone else.”

“Of course I won’t.”

She swats at him playfully. “I mean it. I can’t ask Dad for obvious reasons, and Sam’s half the world away.”

As it turns out, she’s been sort of seeing someone who works at the bingo hall. Morse doesn’t think much of it until he hears the name, and then he vehemently shakes his head. “I interviewed him the other day, and I wouldn’t want a sister of mine to be involved with him.”

The next moment, he realizes his mistake, but she only seems to be thinking of Joyce as she thanks him for his input.

She ends it soon after. Not that there is much to end – seems like they’ve only gone on two dates, and she hasn’t even come so far to reveal her father is a police man.

* * *

Surprising as Joan’s sudden interest in him is, it’s somewhat understandable. Her brother’s joined the army, and as she once pointed out, Morse is one of the few men she known who never made a pass on her.

Sam’s letters are more difficult to explain.

The first one arrives a week after Joan’s broken it off with “Bingo Hall Guy” as she has come to dub him into their conversations, since he seems anxious to get her back there and try again.

_Hello Morse,  
just thought I’d let you know – _

It’s a normal letter, filled with gossip and details about his time away, and Morse still treasures it.

He’s only known him for three years, and yet he remembers teaching him how to read.

Sometimes he wonders if Lestrange isn’t the only one who’s gone mad.

He answers the letter, though. And they keep on coming, even if sometimes, Sam takes so much care to erase a sentence or a word that not even Morse can find out what it said before.

He wonders if Sam and Joan have a few subconscious memories of Lestrange’s spell. It would explain a lot.

* * *

“Are you getting enough sleep?” DI Thursday asks abruptly on a stake out.

Morse sits up and blinks. “Yes, sir” he answers, even though he was close to dozing off. Maybe a part of him is still scared he’ll wake up a strange man, maybe because he feels more maudlin and lonely with every passing day, whatever the reason, he finds it more and more difficult to get a decent night’s sleep.

“I didn’t mean drinking until you pass out.”

There’s something almost fatherly in his voice, something that reminds Morse too much of that different life he could have had, and he’s thankful for the suspect who appears at that very moment.

* * *

It all comes to a head when the bank Joan works at gets robbed. Turns out “Bingo Hall Guy” was after information about their schedule, but she ended things before they could get very far, and so it’s a half-hearted attempt doomed to failure; they never even make it properly into the bank, but they still have to catch them, and soon enough, one of the robbers is holding a civilian he randomly grabbed from the street hostage.

Morse swallows. He’s counted every bullet they shot; DI Thursday is breathing heavily next to him, signalling another one of his coughing attacks; and as he looks into the woman’s terrified eyes, he knows he has to risk it.

“He doesn’t have any bullets left, sir. He’s too stupid to count.”

Predictably, the robber responds by shooting him.

The pain doesn’t come immediately. At first, he’s slightly confused why he’s lying down all of a sudden; then, he wonders why he can feel a hot liquid spread out under him; and only afterwards he registers the burning in his breast, how difficult it is to breathe and realises with a strange feeling of detachment that he might be about to die.

“Dev? Dev!?”

He must be hallucinating.

But really, what’s the point in being careful now? He’s dying anywhere, or close to it. “Father...”

“Dear God, Dev – help is on its way, do you hear? Hold on –“

Thursday starts coughing then, worse than Morse has ever heard him, and his last conscious thought is, _Dear God, help him, please._

* * *

 

After that, he only hear bits and pieces of what’s going on.

“It’s alright matey, ambulance’s here –“

* * *

 

“We’re losing him!”

* * *

 

“He seems to be stable for now –“

* * *

“Please, doctor, I know we’re not family, but we’ve known him for so long –“

“Mrs. Thursday –“

“Doctor please, his sister can’t make it, we’re all he has –“

“Alright, but not for long.”

* * *

 “Oh God, Dev –“

“They’re doing all the can, Joanie.”

“If I had known –“

“You couldn’t have changed a thing.”

* * *

“Be honest with me, Doctor DeBryn. I know the others won’t be.”

“His chances – it doesn’t look –“

“I understand.” 

* * *

“You better get well soon. The Old Man’s all but tearing the station apart. Strange and I barely managed to hold him back – thank God Trewlove spotted him trying to slip past her to the cells. Can’t imagine what would have happened if he’d gotten to him.”

* * *

“Telephone for you, Mrs. Thursday.”

...

“Sam again?”

“You know how close he and Dev are.”

“Would have been. And it’s Morse, here. Dear God, Win, he lay dying and he called me Father... damn near broke my heart.”

“He’d be glad to hear you coughed up the bullet.”

“Yes, but that doesn’t matter if he doesn’t wake up.”

“You know how stubborn he is.”

* * *

 

“Sam asks about Dev all the time.”

“Small wonder with how many phone calls you’ve had these past few months. Could’ve told us.”

“We weren’t sure how much you remembered, Dad.”

“I wasn’t completely certain of Morse, either. Sometimes I thought... At least Win and I had each other, and you had Sam... He’s been carrying this all on his own. Good God.”

“He’ll pull through. He has to.”

* * *

Morse comes to for the first time on a hot morning two weeks after the robbery, as they’ll late tell him.

Bizarrely, the first thing he registers is the clicking of needles besides his bed. He moves a little.

Immediately, the clicking stops. “Dev? Sweetheart? Can you hear me?”

If his mind were clear, he’d react differently, but as is, he can only cough, “Mother?”

“Yes it’s me, dear, don’t worry, I’ll get a doctor – oh Dev, I knew you’d pull through –“

But he slips under again.

* * *

Properly waking up is a long process. Sometime she’s more aware of what’s going on, at others he’s as unresponsive as he’s ever been.

On the afternoon he finally comes to, both Mrs. and DI Thursday are in his room.

His eyes flutter open. The first thing he hears is “Fred!”

The next thing he’s aware of is a hand gripping his shoulder. “Relax, lad. You were shot; you’re in the hospital. You’re going to be fine.”

He manages to focus on Thursday’s face. “Hello, sir” he croaks.

He looks taken aback for a second, then squeezes his shoulder again. “Oy. Win’s getting a doctor.”

This time, he manages to stay awake long enough for them to arrive. “Mr. Morse, glad to see you doing so well.”

“When can I leave?” is his first question.

“Oh, not for a while yet. We don’t want to run until we can walk, do we, Mr. Morse? And once you leave, you’ll be on a few more weeks of bed rest.”

He sighs, thinking of his cold, uncomfortable flat.

“That won’t be a problem” Mrs. Thursday says brightly.

“So I gathered. Now, Mr. Morse –“

* * *

Once the doctor has left them alone, he clears his throat. His memories from the time since he’s been shot are jumbled, but it appears to him that he did quite a few foolish things, and the sooner he –

“Oh, don’t dear”. Mrs. Thursday starts fussing with his bedclothes. “You don’t have to pretend.”

“What –“

“Make no mistake of that, Morse. Noticed you were acting weird, and I’d been getting these – flashes of sorts. Turns out Win had been going through the same. I went to see Lestrange right before he went crazy. Refused to tell me, of course, but then I talked it over with Win and we put the pieces together.”

“Joan and Sam?” he manages to ask.

“Same thing. Now that it’s all out in the open, he’s admitted he had to censure his letters to you, lest he reference something that never happened.”

His mind is swirling. Mrs. Thursday notices, of course. “That’s quite enough for today. You need to rest.”

Slipping into sleep seems like the easiest thing to do.

* * *

 Joyce comes to visit not long after. “Oh, Morse, when I got the call... I couldn’t get away from work. I’m so glad you weren’t alone. The Thursdays are such nice people.”

“They are” he agrees, his throat tight.

When he wakes up after his afternoon nap, Joan and Joyce are giggling about something. It makes a strange feeling swell in his chest.

When she tells him goodbye later, she says, “I’ll see you tomorrow, Dev.”

He can’t get Joan to call him Morse anymore, either.

* * *

As soon as he is well enough to receive phone calls, Sam’s the first to contact him. “Dev!”

“Hello, Sam.”

“Mum said you were doing better!”

“I am going to be released next week, if all goes to plan.”

“Glad to hear it. I wish I could get away –“

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Of course I’m worrying, you doofus!”

He wonders if they remember the same – that there was a time when Sam would call anything that annoyed him as a kid a doofus.

It’s all so confusing.

But he doesn’t feel alone anymore.


	19. Decision

When he is released, naturally it’s the Thursdays who are picking him up. As soon as he realizes that they’re not driving to his flat, he resigns himself to the inevitable. He’s still too weak to put up much of a resistance anyway.

He still tries to protest when he realizes they’ve put a second bed in Sam’s room. “Sir, I –“

“A bit too late for that, wouldn’t you say?”

 _But it wasn’t real_ , he thinks. _You think you care about me that way when you can’t, because I’m not worth it._

He doesn’t know how to say it.

* * *

Mrs. Thursday spends most of his bed rest running up and down the stairs, unless Joan is there to help take care of him. “At least it gets me some exercise” Mrs. Thursday tells him brightly one day.

“You really don’t have to – I’m sure I could make it downstairs in the morning and upstairs at night, Mrs. –“

“It’s Win, I absolutely insist on it. And the doctor said complete bed rest. We’ll have you up and running again in no time.”

He doesn’t quite know how to react to that.

* * *

Some days it feels like the whole station comes to visit him. Strange and DeBryn are among the first.

“Does one good to see you so well taken care of, matey”.

“I agree” DeBryn says dryly, busying checking his temperature even though Morse assured him he didn’t have to, “And if we can get another stone on you I’d be almost prepared ready to call you healthy.”

Morse really wishes he hadn’t said that in Mrs. Thursday’s hearing because from that moment on she seems to double her efforts to feed him up.

Jakes comes by two days later, looking somewhat contrite. “That was a very fine thing you did, for the girl.”

Morse shrugs, pleased that the movement doesn’t cause him any pain. “I did what had to be done.”

“It was still the decent thing to do” he says, looking anywhere but at Morse. “But then, that’s what you usually decide on, isn’t it?”

He leaves soon afterwards, but Morse can’t help but imagine that the Thursdays aren’t the only ones experiencing memory flashes of what never was.

* * *

He tries to protest as the days pass and Mrs. Thursday treats him more and more as she would Joan and Sam, as she would have treated Dev, but his pleas fall on deaf ears. She’s determined to make him part of the family, it seems, when he doesn’t deserve to be in the first place. It was the plan of a madman, and the man she remembers in bits and pieces doesn’t exist.

When Mrs. Thursday – no, Win, she won’t answer to any other name – doesn’t listen, he decides it best to talk to DI Thursday. He comes to see him at least twice a day, usually before he leaves for work and after he comes home, and one day, after he’s returned early, Morse deems them both well-rested enough to breach the subject.

“Sir...” he begins, but Thursday shakes his head.

“I see what Win meant; it feels odd to have you call me that.”

“It’s the proper way to do it, sir” he pleads. “And I know that Mrs. Thursday is – that she thinks – that –“ he breaks off, unsure of how to proceed. He can’t very well accuse the wife of his superior officer of letting herself be controlled by strange fancies.

Thursday sighs and sits down on the chair by his bed. “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t expect this, Dev.”

Morse would correct him, but he suspects he’s addressing him such deliberately. “I – I don’t know exactly what each of you remembers” he says carefully.

“You can recall the whole thing, can’t you? Should have expected it, with that brain of yours.”

Morse looks away.

Thursday gently touches his shoulder. “Wasn’t a criticism, lad.”

It’s _wrong_ , that what it is. He doesn’t deserve to be treated like Thursday’s children: he never did, he never will. “Yes, I do remember everything” he eventually says, “Lestrange did a good job.”

“I’d say. When I saw you on the ground...” Thursday lowers his voice. “He can be damn glad Strange took him down seconds after he’d shot you.”

And that the others kept Thursday from getting to him, after. “But that’s just what I mean, sir” he replies, “It’s not – you can’t make something real out of something that’s not. It never happened.”

“If there’s one thing I learned in the war, it’s that sometimes things that never happened can have quite as much an impact as those that did. And I don’t think you’ll easily get rid of us now, Dev, not with Win and Joan and Sam – boy must have blown half his savings on long-distance calls once he and Joan figured what was going on.”

“I didn’t want him to.”

“Of course you didn’t, but he still decided to do it” Thursday says firmly. “What Lestrange did to us was no one’s fault but his own; and what we’re doing now, that’s our own decision. _We’d be glad to have you_. And for what it’s worth, I mean it as much as I would have, that day at the lake.”

Morse doesn’t know how to answer, but he’s spared the attempt by Joan bursting in. “Hey, Dad, Mum said you came home early – Dev, I brought you strawberries. The doctor says you can eat those.”

The look Thursday shoots him is nothing short of amused.

* * *

By the time he’s allowed out of bed, Morse knows he has to make a decision. Win and Joan treat him like a family member, Sam has made a habit of calling once a week in addition to his letters, and it becomes more and more difficult to call DI Thursday “sir” when he so obviously doesn’t want him to.

He should break this all off, he knows. None of it was real, so what would be the point to pretend?

But Mrs. Thursday has made stew again, DI Thursday makes a point of coming home early, Joan won’t allow him to set the table, and as he watches them, he realizes something.

Saying no – insisting on it, making a clean break – would hurt the Thursdays. And he can’t allow Lestrange to do that, not from beyond wherever his madness has taken him.

And then he remembers Tanner and Hardy. They study the same texts Lestrange used; maybe they can help him. Make everyone but him forget. He’s ready to pay that prize, if it means the Thursdays aren’t hurt.

So for now, he resigns himself being pampered and being fussed over by Win and Fred (as they insist he calls them).

* * *

Becoming DC Morse once more instead of Dev Thursday is easier said than done.

By the time he’s finally allowed back into his flat, Win has transformed it into something that could actually be called a home, with a full fridge, comfortable bedding, enough cutlery and even a potted plant.  

Joan won’t allow him to slip out of their grasp, either;  urged to by by Sam and her own attachment to the Dev she remembers, she keeps showing up, dragging him out of his flat, or home when she manages to.

Once he’s returned to work, things become difficult to navigate. DI Thursday is obviously doing his best, but he can’t always hide the fact that he looks at Morse as more than a subordinate now. Paradoxically, things become easier after he slips up and calls him “Dev” once – Strange seems to be delighted by the nickname and proceeds to use it and soon, everyone is doing it.

He wishes it would bother him more.

* * *

Sometimes, he manages to say no to dinner, sometimes not. At least he usually gets away before he and DI Thursday can have a drink together, like the father and son who never existed.

They let him go, but Win always looks a little wistful as they do so.

* * *

 

Morse goes to see Hardy – he figures he has a better chance with him – as soon as he can. This madness has to stop.

Hardy isn’t surprised to see him. “There have been rumours flying around” he says carefully.

Morse nods.

“But from what I can gather, it wasn’t – he didn’t really – what I mean to say is that the effects don’t appear particularly bad to me.”

“They’re not. But there’s a right and a wrong, Mr. Hardy.”

“See, that’s why I like old-fashioned alchemy. More grey areas there.”

He still gives him a bag to burn at midnight.

* * *

That evening, Jakes approaches him. He doesn’t think much of it when he orders him to have a pint with him one evening – he probably doesn’t want to pay for his own beer; but then Jakes proceeds to buy him a pint, stare into his own an finally say roughly, “You’re not doing anyone any favours, you know.”

He blinks. “What –“

“You know damn well what I mean.”

He looks away, even though Jakes still hasn’t raised his head. “What they – what I – it wasn’t real.”

“What does it matter? Some people want things, and some people get things. And some people don’t appreciate what they get, even if they want it.”

He swallows. “Peter –“

“Exactly, _Dev_.” Until now, Jakes was one of the few who stuck to Morse. “So what are you going to do?”

* * *

 

When he comes home, he sits down at his kitchen table and looks at the bag. Midnight, Hardy said, with a five-minute margin to either side of the full hour. A new start for everyone without the bothersome memories, except for Morse, but what does that matter?

He swallows. It matters because the Thursdays don’t _completely_ treat him like they would Dev. It has taken him a while to notice, but by now, Win regularly tells him how to cook things (“Start slow, dear, just an egg now and then, you know what Doctor DeBryn said –“), Joan has started dropping hints about which ones of her friends like opera, and even Sam...

His eyes drift over to the German book about Wagner he sent him a few weeks back. On the front page he wrote _Know your German wasn’t that good in... well, but you can speak it here, right?_ And it’s even true.

Fred – DI Thursday – that’s more complicated. For both of them. But in a way, Lestrange was right; they were always more towards each other than simply a DI and his bagman, almost from the start.

Morse looks at the bag and wonders how much of him wishing to delete everyone’s memories is actually being decent and how much is him being a coward, because returning to the status quo would be easier than navigate this new, maddening and yet magical existence.

And then he realizes something.

He doesn’t think he’d make a good Dev Thursday in this world, if he tried. But neither did he ever feel comfortable as Endeavour Morse.

But with practice, he could probably make a decent Dev Morse.

Wearing gloves, he carefully picks the bag Hardy gave him apart and distributes its contents between the bins in the neighbourhood.

It’s midnight, and Dev has made a decision, for better or worse.  

* * *

He doesn’t try to weasel himself out of the invitations Win bestows on him anymore after that, or to protest when Joan decides she needs someone to go shopping with her. Nor does he resist much when it’s clear Fred needs someone to talk to after dinner.

“Stopped running away, have you?” he asks one evening, but his voice is tense in the way it usually is when he berates one of his children, that mixture of worry, anger and care Morse is coming to recognize, and he doesn’t answer. “Whish this wasn’t all as complicated as it was” he continues.

“After careful deliberation, I don’t think it is, Fred.”

That actually makes them both laugh, and Morse thinks that yes, he just needs a little bit more practice...

* * *

 

Time passes. He doesn't quite sure whether or not he's making progress, but he's certainly put on a bit of weight and needs less drinks to go to sleep at night. 

* * *

He gets strong-armed to pick Sam up at the train station with the others. He didn’t mean to – he was invited to tea, and he was of the opinion that he would leave afterwards and come back the next day to greet Sam – but instead he’s soon standing at the platform next to Joan.

Sam coming home isn’t as much of a surprise as it probably should be.

He all but bounces out of the train, his face lighting up as he sees them. “Dev!” He tackles him into a hug.

“Hello, boys, older sister who also wants a hug is standing right here” Joan announces and he draws back laughing.

“Sorry, Joanie. When’s Joyce coming?”

“Next week. She’ll start her job soon after” Dev replies.

He grins. “Can’t wait to meet her.”

Yes, Morse reflects as they pass down the street to the nearest pub, he’s sure she’ll truly fit right in.

* * *

Thursday is getting their drinks (Dev, to the relief of them all, having asked for orange juice) when the barman says, “You’re lucky, governor.”

“I beg your pardon?”

He nods towards their table. Thursday turns his head to find Sam relating a story with the others listening, Joan leaning over Dev’s shoulder in the same way she would if he were her little brother.

“Mine are like cats and dogs. Your kids seem close.”

“They are” he replies, “Always have been”.

After all, in a way, it’s true.

He smiles to himself as he grabs their drinks and returns to their table.

And to his family – related by blood or not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has been a very fun journey. Hope I could fulfill your expectations, and that you enjoyed the conclusion. Thank you for all your kind comments!


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